Auckland a City of Opportunity?
A new report comparing Auckland with 30 other international cities by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) paints a grim picture in many of the categories we talk about. Titled “A City of Opportunity”, the report released last year compared 30 cities from around the world.…
20 Comments Sunday reading 26 July 2015
Jarrett Walker, “Explainer: The Transit Ridership Recipe“, Human Transit. An epic post by Jarrett where he outlines the fundamentals to delivering high ridership public transit.
The most successful transit, in terms of ridership achieved for a fixed operating budget, is called mass transit for a reason. …
Appeals against Skypath
There have been two appeals against the consent for Skypath. They are from the Northcote Residents Association (NRA) and the Northcote Point Heritage Preservation Society (NPHPS) – a group set up in December last year just to oppose Skypath. Both parties want the entire decision overturned with the NRA also seeking costs.…
Common Acronyms page
We use a lot of acronyms here at TransportBlog. We try to write them out in full the first time we use them in a post, but we won’t always remember – sorry in advance! With that in mind we’ve created a page (under the About heading) to list them so readers can reference them if they’re not sure what something means.…
AT July Board Meeting
On Monday the Auckland Transport board hold their next board meeting and as I normally do, I’ve gone through the reports to see what’s being discussed. Starting with the closed session we have a number of topics that could be quite interesting.…
Do it right the first time
Several months back, I took a look at the way we’re designing street networks and neighbourhoods in greenfield subdivisions. It’s not a pretty picture. The reigning assumption seems to be that places on the edge of the city are car-dependent now and will be car-dependent forever.…
Literature: W.G. Sebald on urban growth
A while back, I read the following passage in W.G. Sebald’s spectacular novel The Rings of Saturn. In the book, Sebald tours the coastline of East Anglia, along with his own memory and England’s history. In a book full of striking, thoughtful passages, I was particularly struck by the following one:
Over the centuries that followed, catastrophic incursions of the sea into the land of this kind happened time and again, and, even during the long years of apparent calm, coastal erosion continued to take its natural course.…
NZTA OIA Response on Additional Harbour Crossing
Prompted by the news that the NZTA is tendering work for route protection of the Additional Waitemata Harbour Crossing (AWHC), I initiated an OIA request to the NZTA which has now been responded to.
I requested, on behalf of the Campaign for Better Transport:
1.…
How might the RMA amendments and the Auckland Plan impact on the Unitary Plan?
The advertisement below is from the last local government elections. Here Councillor Denise Krum rallies against the draft Unitary Plan, especially the degree to which it enables “intensification”. Denise’s advertisement claims the draft Unitary Plan is “too intense” and will “change our streets forever”. …
Development update: July 2015
This month I’m going to look at one of the fastest growing types of housing – retirement villages. There are often several different typologies in a retirement village, from detached villas to duplexes, independent apartments, serviced apartments through to rest home, hospital and dementia care – but let’s set that to one side.…
Processing...