Good news with AT announcing that the Quay St cycleway that was consulted on a few months ago will start construction this week. They also say the first section from Lower Quay St to Commerce St will be finished by Mid-May

Construction of Quay Street cycleway begins next week and is expected to open in July.

Initially work will be focused on Lower Hobson Street to Commerce Street. We aim to complete work in this area by mid-May, before City Rail Link (CRL) works begin in the same area.

Disruption will be minimised by keeping lanes open during morning and evening busy periods. Some lane closures will occur outside of these times to enable construction.

They’ve also released this new image showing what it will look like.

Quay Street Cycleway - Lower Albert St

You can see the detailed plans (5MB) for the cycleway here although they still haven’t shown the section going past Queens Wharf which they were re-designing.

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41 comments

    1. We should be hearing more about Tamaki Dr at least as far as the Ngapipi intersection soon. That section is being done as part of the Glen Innes to Tamaki Dr project

  1. A fair degree of tricky detail design work but can’t wait to use it. Thumbs up linking it with Beach Road

    1. I might be missing something but I can’t see the link with Beach Road, unless you mean the shared path linking at Mahuhu.

  2. Fantastic news. Once it links with the Tamaki and foreshore cycleways you’ll have the roots of a large tree.

  3. No indication of how it might continue in the direction of Nelson St?
    To minimise vehicle crossings Market Pl looks good, or will it run along the base of the Fanshawe St retaining wall? It’d be preferable not to have to stop and cross to the other side of main roads, as this on average takes a lot longer than going straight ahead

  4. “before City Rail Link (CRL) works begin in the same area.” – hopefully that doesn’t mean it’ll be dug up again soon after opening.

  5. It’s still on the wrong side of the
    road, no utility. What does it do that the shared path (up until Queen St.) didn’t?

    On the other side you can access side streetstreet, restaurants, countdown and the shared path to beach road at Britomart place. I submitted as such but was told it’s fine like it is. It’s not. I even drew my own that I will think about every time I don’t use this.

    https://twitter.com/davidjroos/status/700005317434810368

    1. Well I thought about this too, I get your argument, however when considered in detail, which you must have if you drew it, you see that all those side streets would make it a slow stop start affair. Meh; either side it’s a trade off.

      Furthermore, it is best understood as stage one of two one-way paths, in other words the best way to also get the side you want is for this two-way one to become so unmanageably busy that more capacity is needed, making a strong case for both side when the full street rebuild and road diet is done…. And done here it could well get that busy.

      I don’t accept its like trying to ride on the footpath; riders will actually have our own space, like on Nelson St. And I’d argue that Nelson St is the best of the recent city cycling additions, this will work well too for most people.

      1. Well, sure it’s speedy now, but where can you go? Does it need offramps? I thought we were against waterfront highways?

        I don’t trust any future plans. This is going to be it for
        10+ years and I won’t accept glaring usability failures as stepping stones – this is what is easy not what is good.

        1. Good grief, what do you mean? This isn’t the Hotel California; you can leave anytime you like!

          Seriously this is an on street route, unlike say the Grafton Gully bike highway, every metre of it is literally an on/off ramp. No new infra is needed to access any point along it. In particular the obvious access points are at the cross streets where with a bike you can take advantage of its in between nature and cross either with the road traffic or the ped crossing (dismounting if you are feeling obedient).

        2. Nelson St is a similar design with those concrete dividers and cyclists join and exit them with ease. Some people are on road for the steep bit then duck back in at Cook st intersection. At Victoria St, pedestrians are catching on that the cyclist light phase gives them a barns dance as well as their normal phase. So I don’t anticipate any problems on Quay St.

      2. Patrick,

        In general, this idea that intersections add friction is more true for vehicular traffic than for walking or cycling. For the latter, intersections tend represent a greater gain in opportunities to travel to more destinations in less time (faster effective speed), than the absolute drop in speed to get to any one of them. That is, a dense, intersection-rich network will speed up cycling for a mass population much more than a sparse, intersection-free environment. Only cars, trucks, buses and trains (which tend to grind to a halt when traffic streams cross — quite unlike the traffic engineer’s “water in pipes” analogy) stand to benefit from reducing exposure to intersections (as in, motorways).

        In particular, if intersections like the side streets on Quay St are obstacles to speedy travel, then something else is wrong: probably right-of-way or time prioritisation. The only way that a few intersections can so seriously detract from cycling that it’s worth avoiding, is if other, crashier (technical term) modes get in the way (i.e. car block movement). So once again, the answer is to embrace the intersection in the design process — not to elide, ignore or neglect it — and do something about cycle traffic prioritisation. Green waves, frequent phasing, simultaneous-green, longer crossing times, etc. That we don’t still do any of this is a major flaw in our approach.

        Nelson St may be the best in class given Auckland’s low standards, but that’s nothing to aspire to; it’s something to improve on, a lesson to learn from. Nelson St also suffers frontage-phobia and intersection-ignorance. Nelson St’s cycleway hovers above the slip road, disconnecting it from many useful front doors (apartments and all) and — amazingly — on both sides of the street; likewise the City Works Depot. That leaves approximately one block of frontage directly facing a three-block cycleway. And then there are the intersections with forbidden turning movements, unsupported approaches/exits, and miserly signal timing. This is not how to grow a network for mass city cycling.

        1. I do love me a perfectionist; but one with no strategy on how to get to realise their high standards will remain a frustrated dreamer stuck in traffic.

          As I’ve admitted before on this forum I am happy to out myself to having become an incrementalist; I’ve seen it working, it is working; right now in Auckland the route to best is via better.

          But keep up the pressure, there’s no right way; we need the whole eco-system of approaches.

        2. The strategy is to just do it right. The Dutch had to invent this stuff, and their incremental work means that we don’t, so there is no excuse for such misunderstanding of bike Lane requirements (i.e. intersection access)

        3. >> I do love me a perfectionist; but one with no strategy on how to get to realise their high standards will remain a frustrated dreamer stuck in traffic.

          I’ve outlined possible strategies in comments on this very blog in the past, so perhaps my mistake is in failing to invest the resources (that I don’t have) to publicise it well enough. Too bad.

          To refresh your memory, my proposed strategy (an evolving one as I do more and more extensive research, I confess) is as follows.

          Principles:

          * We want mass urban cycling. Mass means the largest number of people, aged 8-to-80. Urban means in the city (a place with many interesting buildings near each other, that people want to travel between, generally considered “short” distances). Cycling means using bicycles, cargo cycles, or whatever, to move people and goods.
          * We want to minimize cycling where possible by having people walk or live closer to a destination — i.e. we don’t want cycling for cycling’s sake (it’s not primarily about sport or recreation). Or for longer distances, we want people to transfer to transit.
          * We recognize that streets are primarily the interstitial spaces between the doors of buildings, and what makes them useful is the ability to reach those buildings.
          * To get people cycling between front doors, we want more front doors to be bike-accessible. This is a lot like wheelchair ramps; we should recognize that almost all buildings ought to be accessible by cycles, as they should be by wheelchair. Only it’s not just about building a ramp or lift, but stretching a path out along the street.
          * We recognize that intersections space-efficiently optimize paths for reaching destinations.
          * We recognize that the movement of vehicles is different to walking or cycling. The crashier modes tend to fatally suffer friction at intersections even at low densities, whereas streams of bike or foot traffic can merge and flow transparently even at high densities. Additionally, vehicles travel much, much faster in straight, uninterrupted lines, so they have more to lose when conflicting with cross-traffic — hence highways — whereas bikes (mass urban cycling style) don’t gain much speed on a “highway”. What is considered “friction” for motoring (an undesirable feature) should be considered “traction” for people who are engaging with the city (a desirable feature).
          * To provide more short, cycling routes in a dense area (such as a bike catchment), we seek to make an intersection-rich network. In this network, intersections are high-value objects, higher in priority for treatment. Routes should seek out and embrace intersections, accounting for every turning movement, approach and exit. Furthermore, bike-enabling short trips along streets will, in time, also serve long trips by bike, as streets in neighbourhood grids invariably link up; thus we do not recognize “bike highways” (those separated from buildings) as a high priority.
          * A wide variety of user-experience features matter at the detailed design level, and this is best solved by applying interaction design practice, not traffic engineering alone. A key component of this is to measure the usability of elements of the public realm for cycling. I propose counting “events” in simulations as a factor — in which “improvisation” (defensive manoeuvres, evasion, footpath riding, red light running, etc) is an undesirable outcome that drives down the perceived safety and/or attractiveness of cycling.

          Strategy:

          Key move 1 (low-hanging fruit):

          * Luckily, we can analyse the existing street grid in Auckland to find neighbourhoods with good bones — i.e. underlying street grids waiting to be capitalized for cycling. Streetcar suburbs, including the city centre, Onehunga, etc are good candidates, as are some neighbourhoods like Te Atatu. We can rehabilitate the bones of the grid by patching up culs-de-sac, or introducing short bits of greenway and bridges over natural barriers, etc, with the sole and directed purpose of reconnecting specific streets.
          * Then we can prioritise by destination density ­— the flesh on the bones — and select a list of areas where cycling interventions would maximize frontage exposure, including origins/destinations weighted by some utility (schools, stations, etc are more important). Here we assign routes (down to which side of the street) to hug buildings (yes, driveways and front doors), as well as the intersections identified above.
          * Finally, we can attack these routes (likely in a grid shape) with a user-centric approach to detailed design, seeking to minimize the likelihood of defensive improvisation on a bike (but in effect maximizing free improvisation to travel anywhere, in any order, in arbitrary trips). This might involve treating intersections only (highest priority), adding protected approaches/exits, introducing separation in time, or rolling out many mid-block paths and crossings (protected or not, as appropriate), and traffic calming and filtered permeability for motor traffic. We’d avoid random spot fixes like splashing green paint to little effect, applying a measurable minimum standard of treatment.
          * In areas selected for such treatment, interventions should be built incrementally, as temporary trials where needed, and in consultation with locals. There are ways to do this right (design charrettes, neighbourhood improvement, local mobility plans, etc), and then there is the way we currently do it…

          Key move 2 (high-hanging fruit):

          * For those areas identified with poorer underlying street patterns, the first priority should not be to switch on bike infrastructure, but rather to heal the street grid. The main thrust in suburbs like Albany, Massey and Pakuranga should be to reconnect streets to each other, bringing it up to speed with where those streetcar suburbs are in their development.
          * The main measurable goal should be walkability, not bikeability, and focused around transit services, not local centres or schools as much.
          * As a long-term goal, these neighbourhoods can be revisited with the same lens (and funding) as with the first set of bike-enabled suburbs.

          Key move 3 (optimize, iterate, maintain):

          * Following the initial development of bike-enabled neighbourhoods/catchments, there will inevitably be capacity problems, and opportunities for optimization will arise, with a strong case of current demand. Unlike counting swimmers before building a bridge (as we do today), these users will be enjoying at least a minimum standard of treatment — so it’s more like counting bridge users on a too-narrow bridge. So we can start to optimize the network with zero lead time to realizing the benefits. Likewise, some initial treatments may be cheap or become under-specification with growing demand, so it will be time to iterate to improve designs.
          * Grand optimizations may include flagship routes, bypasses, bike highways, scenic routes, rail trails, park loops, bikeable boardwalks, etc. Humbler optimizations may involve widening paths, upgrading bike intersection priority, deepening network density down multiple degrees of side streets/lanes, treating overlooked spots, expanding bike parking, etc.
          * As temporary becomes permanent, the maintenance lifecycle begins. This is straightforward, but it’s important to note as AT/NZTA/Council need to develop the machinery, budgets and processes to carry it out for a growing street network. Also, this is an opportunity to foster more positive local involvement by devolving some of the ownership/control to neighbourhood groups, etc.

          That’s a sketch of my strategy. If that’s a dream, then your reality is a nightmare — but I don’t think it is so unrealistic. One way that some aspects of this is playing out (or so I hear) is in Mangere Future Streets. Bike Te Atatu’s own plan lands near the mark as well. I’ll leave it as an exercise to the reader to figure out how politicians and advocates can fit into such a scheme, as I’m running out of time for this post.

          >> I’ve seen it working, it is working; right now in Auckland the route to best is via better.

          It isn’t working. Cycle trips are increasing modestly, but that’s riding a generational wave of interest in cycling anyway, as well as a population boom in Auckland areas (i.e. despite the conditions). We need better standards for determining what’s working, and for whom; but my anecdotal experience (as opposed to yours) suggests it’s leaving a lot of people behind, especially those in less privileged circumstances.

        4. Patrick,

          The political strategy is straightforward. Harder to implement, of course, but not complicated. There is precedent for this both overseas and locally. You’ll note each key move has natural roles for politicians, advocates, activists and most importantly, local people, to drive change.

          * The first tool is to develop trial projects, with the guarantee that changes will be rolled back or amended if unsuccessful. This is a page out of JSK’s book. Interestingly, the value of the proposition is in building trust with potential local opponents; NY’s experience was that projects rarely had to be rolled back.
          * Another tool is neighbourhood activism, something like Transport Alternatives’ work in NY. We know that cycling is a popular idea already, and there is support for a transition to active modes in the Auckland Plan (developed with consultation). So the idea is to find a constituency for change among a local neighbourhood where an intervention may take place, which is almost always lurking, but perhaps un-organized. TA took the role of uncovering those people, developing those bonds, and presenting a credible, grassroots group in support of, say, a trial project. I’ve observed how AT behaved in a recent project in my neighbourhood; they inadvertently built an organized constituency against change (fostering pro-parking, anti-cycling voices), whilst neglecting even the loud and clear supportive local voices. Now, some of this is emerging with the various neighbourhood bike groups, but they need to be more general than cycling.
          * A vehicle for ensuring all these voices are heard is a “local mobility plan”, spanning not only cycling but also motoring and transit. There is obviously merit in developing high-level, city-wide network plans, but for neighbourhood improvement, a different way of slicing up programmes is useful. Asking locals in consultation to identify transport issues, come to consensus on priorities (including those previously marginalized voices), and developing fine-grained solutions, is an effective way to get buy-in for omnibus changes to a small area. This is not structured to seem like cyclists are invading to displace car parking, but rather that a representative group of neighbours collaborate to find space for each other (ideally), which can confidently include parking space reallocation. It also allows integrating solutions down to the last-metre, such as bike access through train station entrance, etc. It’s fraught, but at least has a chance of success, unlike our current way. The CNU school practices design charrettes as a method for bringing people together under one roof to determine solutions for their local areas — something worth trying here.
          * Neighbourhood improvement is another theme that resonates well in a NZ context, particularly in the leafy (read: streetcar) suburbs of Auckland. They’ve succeeded not only at opposing development, but also traffic calming and green space improvement in many cases, so there’s great potential to work with such groups if the consultation protocol is carefully handled.
          * You can clearly see chances for local body politicians to get involved with these tools. A local mobility plan fits well into the scale of a local board’s jurisdiction. I see activism that builds a local constituency for change opening up platform space for (at least some) local board members to stand on. These same politicians liaise with neighbourhood groups already, and can help mediate before anyone gets a whiff of a David/Goliath fight.
          * AT/Council can foster momentum for changes in such a direction by providing support for street closures (for car traffic), street parties, and the like. It can begin with non-controversial demonstrations like Car-Free Sundays on Queen St, but attach to it a proactive outreach programme to help your neighbourhood go car-free too, expediting the process of permits and traffic management, etc.
          * I think once the local boards are happy with the soundness of the consultation and the trust in trial projects, ward councillors, MPs and the rest will follow suit. If successful, they are likely to get a sense of the ground shifting beneath them, but in a good way. No central government or NZTA support is necessary, at least early on, other than getting out of the way. In exceptional cases, NZTA might help with a pedestrian/cycle bridge across (not along) a motorway or two, but that’s well within scope already. However, I can see the potential for all political parties to endorse a programme like this if it has any traction after a few development cycles (that is, until we get a motorists’ party).
          * There is a lot of work to do modernizing technical standards and indeed the culture of local experts, much of which frames and limits the choices on the table for non-experts. That work is itself a kind of political struggle, and there can be a role for NZTA in particular, but also Council directing AT, to embrace new design standards and guidance.
          * More importantly, there is a lot of work to do in raising public awareness about the needs and benefits of cycling improvement, or indeed of street improvement. Here I think is the distinct and unique job of advocates (if not activists) to set out a clear vision, a set of principles, and translate it for the general public. This should help frame discussions, consultations, policies, elections, news pieces and the rest. We’ve seen it work spectacularly with the CRL, and the CFN/New Network in transit network terms, but cycling (or humane street) networks are overdue the same treatment.
          * There are missed opportunities with such things as the Unitary Plan, which has a huge impact on the bones & flesh of the cycling network (if not the skin). I see local change constituencies being involved in that too, as advocates for intensified building development should also support relevant cycling initiatives.

          There’s the basis of a political strategy. Viable?

      3. “all those side streets” → I have to agree with the others, if side streets are a problem when laying cycle paths, there is something fatally wrong with how we think about cycle paths.

        It seems cycling infrastructure is introduced in 3 phases:
        – phase 1: out of sight. Build it but only where it doesn’t touch the street grid. Eg. grafton gully, northwestern cycleway, lightpath.
        – phase 2: out of the way. OK, it can touch the street grid but only where it doesn’t get into the way. Eg. Nelson Street, Quay Street.
        – phase 3: in the way. New cycleways will get built properly. Loss of parking spots or less priority for cars are considered acceptable.

        We have now reached phase 2. Given the insane amount of pushback, especially over parking, we will probably stay in that phase for a while. But it definitely is progress over phase 1, or nothing at all.

        And this entire priority thing will need time as well. Having pedestrians giving away to turning cars. And traffic lights are often programmed to have an as-short-as-possible pedestrian phase and then a long left turn phase for cars. A lot of pedestrian lights have a delay of a few minutes before they give green to pedestrians.

        And by the way, I think the thing making this start-stop affairs so slow is the long phasing of traffic lights. I can understand the need during rush hour, but I have been standing along Hobson Street a lot of times wondering why we need a 2 minute green phase to let 20 cars pass. (and the 1.5 minute green phase for turning traffic, with often no cars turning at all)

        1. Don’t disagree with your phasing; just can’t catastrophise about it. After all even Amsterdam and Copenhagen rebuilt their cities incrementally. In fact I don’t think there is any other way to do it.

          Regards Bikelash; it is to be welcomed; it means we’ve moved out of Phase One. Bring it on.

        2. Patrick,

          This is a tiresome misunderstanding that is disappointing coming from you: no one is arguing against doing things incrementally. The only disagreement is about what the increments are, how they are shaped, whether they are optimally efficient (note: optimal, not perfect), in what order they are built, where the opportunity costs lie, and basically, how do we realise the return on investment? These are all valid and sound questions to worry about, just as TransportBlog does eminently well in terms of public transport and roading. Just as we want a congestion-free network (i.e. a mode-agnostic connection-oriented transit grid, to use Jarrett Walker’s terminology), we should want an intersection-rich bike-enabled filtered street grid maximizing frontage exposure, for cycling and walking.

          Try a thought experiment: suppose we built what David Roos suggested at the same development speed as the current Quay St proposal. Would that be non-incremental? Would it be perfection? Would we wake up the day after the ribbon-cutting to find ourselves speaking Dutch? Of course not. We would only have built a better increment — perhaps the right increment under the current circumstances, if not the best possible increment for all time — to realise a greater marginal gain for the cycling network than the current proposal, either enjoyable immediately or enabling earlier or still greater multiplicative gains in a mid- or long-term programme.

          Additionally, I’d argue that we are not currently taking a sincerely incremental approach at all! We’re either building ostentatious infrastructure — but opportunistically (more or less “by the motorway”) — or worthless pastiche jobs with paint and signs that don’t add up. A smarter programme would seek to build humbler infrastructure but with a directed vision towards ubiquitous, bike-enabled streets (as above), but also with a ramped opening strategy. That is, we should be deploying cheap, temporary trial projects all over the city, with real fixes that get people out riding between front doors — treating hairy intersections to account for all bike movements, tweaking signal phases, adding hundreds of new mid-block pedestrian and bike crossings, etc. There are many lions with a thorn in their paws.

          So it is indeed about better, not perfect. We’re asking for something realistically better (not perfect). Does that help you see our perspective better (if not perfectly)?

        3. I forgot who wrote it, but I read a while ago that if you build bike lanes, and nobody is protesting against it, you’re probably doing it wrong. I think Bikelash will mostly be directed against phase 3. Phase 3 is also the only phase which will enable a meaningful uptake in bicycling.

        4. roeland, yes that’s my point, but you’ve just contradicted yourself; you said we’re at 2, but now have Bikelash. I agree with that, you’re earlier position; we’re at 2 and we have Bikelash. Like I say, bring it on.

        5. These constant long rants are tiresome. Yes absolutely things should be done perfectly from day one but there are many factors that need to be taken into account. For example in the case of Quay St once the CRL works start the CBD basically goes into lock down and no street changes can happen. As part of those works the section on the southern side from Commerce to Albert is pretty much dedicated to construction works or the need to manage buses. Now sure we could have a cycleway on that side but it wouldn’t exactly be all that pleasant and the crossings mean there’s not too much impact for those on bikes to accessing the north/south streets. Once CRL works out of the way it means Quay St can be finally fixed and as part of that I fully expect we should see better outcomes.

        6. Not really a contradiction. Every phase will get bikelash. Even (1) got some, for instance some home owners demanded the northwestern cycleway went to the motorway side of the sound wall. We can think of these phases as a compromise between what would ideally be implemented, and what is currently politically feasible. As we make progress in making bicycling more acceptable and the backlash gets less, (2) and later (3) will become feasible. Patrick is right, incrementally is the only way.

          Nelson Street cycleway I think is somewhere between (2) and (3). It is still sitting on an edge of Nelson Street without driveways, but on the other hand it did take 2 lanes away from a street which is now more or less congested in the morning (but then again, the fact that it wasn’t congested is a testament to how overbuilt it was). Cyclists also got their own phase on the intersection with Victoria Street. While it is not ideal it is a massive improvement on how it was before.

        7. Endless frustration at poor incremental improvements leaves people feeling a bit let down (or a lot). The Dominion Rd parallel routes are an example. Then they built Carlton Gore Road but are now rebuilding a lot of Park Rd for buses and have completely left bikes of the list of modes. Need I mention the mess that is the Don Buck Road UCF project that is absolute rubbish and does nothing for incrementalism?

          All in, I don’t really have an issue with the Quay St bike lane as I always presumed it would be like this (which is not actually what I had hoped for).

        8. Yes this is tiresome, or at least is becoming so. I think you misunderstand me; I don’t wish you to change whatever you’re doing, i like what you’re doing.

          I’m just explaining my chosen path, no criticism of yours, we have different ideas of what’s worth fighting for and against and I think that’s fine, any movement of any scale is stronger if it accommodates an entire ecosystem of approaches.

          I have been in consultation on this route so I know _exactly_ the forces we are up against here, even just inside AT, I also prefer to take a long view, which ironically in this case involves grabbing this opportunity to get a quick temporary piece of infra in. The alternative is nothing; you would prefer that?

          I am in full agreement with you about the motorway routes, we all understand their limitations, but where I do disagree is the idea that there is something to be gained by opposing them. On the contrary I am still firmly of the view that they are proving useful primers and even will become Ok parts of our eventual networks. But crucially are the only available path to getting that Network from our institutions and polity. Eye on the prize. In fact I have been surprised and pleased to be more wrong than right about just how pointless I expected the Pinkpath to be in practice. I still maintain it is mostly symbolic value, but it actually turns out to have great utility for NW cycleway/westside city workers, this is observable in the tidal weekday flows, and unexpectedly as a strangely popular linear park for city apartment dwellers. I certainly use Nelson St now as my preferred way up from downtown. And the pink is joyfully transformational and more than a bit subversive there in the middle of the CMJ. So really I’m just not going to slag it off. If this disappoints you then I’m not not sure there’s much i can do about that.

        9. Matt,

          >> Yes absolutely things should be done perfectly from day one but there are many factors that need to be taken into account.

          You’re literally responding to a comment in which I argued I’m not asking for perfection from day one, so let’s not rehash that.

          The rest of your comment I agree with, especially considering Quay St was always pitched as an iterative process in tandem with CRL works. My issue was limited to the various defenses about speed vs intersections, and mischaracterizing “perfectionists” and “dreamers”, etc. We’d have fewer rants, I suspect, if we could move beyond those myths.

          Patrick,

          >> I think you misunderstand me; I don’t wish you to change whatever you’re doing, i like what you’re doing.

          Okay, I’ve learned something new. I like what you’re doing too, otherwise I wouldn’t take time to engage. (I read/listen more than I write/speak, even counting the long comments.)

          >> I have been in consultation on this route so I know _exactly_ the forces we are up against here, even just inside AT, I also prefer to take a long view, which ironically in this case involves grabbing this opportunity to get a quick temporary piece of infra in. The alternative is nothing; you would prefer that?

          No, I think the Quay St project should go ahead, but I look forward to holding AT to account when the CRL works are done, as they said the layout is to be revisited. It’s just worthwhile flagging that fact, as well as the project’s evident shortcomings (which may well be proved wrong in practice), as David did. I don’t think the particular counterpoints to his comment hold water, that’s all.

        10. Patrick,

          >> I am in full agreement with you about the motorway routes, we all understand their limitations, but where I do disagree is the idea that there is something to be gained by opposing them … If this disappoints you then I’m not not sure there’s much i can do about that.

          That is also disappointing, but not what I raised initially. It’s heading off-topic so I’ll just say it’s scary to consider the economics of the pink path etc, especially considering the opportunity cost. I know the “realist” argument is to take what we can get (and the more expensive the better), but I don’t think that is the role of advocacy — someone needs to set a clear vision, a la CFN, and to lay out the principles of what really works and why we need it. Public cluefulness about cycling needs is one of the most tragic casualties of unreservedly supporting these suboptimal (not imperfect) projects — i.e. I don’t think we all understand the limitations of motorway routes, or the function of bike accessibility on streets. We don’t have a cogent and correct “story” about what cycling is really for, how it really works, and most importantly, how it can really work for you there, in that SUV. Contrast that with the success of the “frequent transit grid” story that Jarrett Walker introduced, which is filtering through as the New Network, along with your own advocacy for the CRL (improving train frequency across the network) — despite the uphill propaganda struggle. I don’t know if there’s anything you can do about it (whether you should is of course up to you, anyway); I can’t demand more from the blog; but you might consider letting us dreamers and perfectionists call out problems without having to defend, well, geometry, math and physics. 🙂

  6. Anyone asked Emergency services what they think of the raised concrete? Must be a nightmare to drive over / around if attending to emergencies, accidents, sick people. The concrete strips are too high.

    1. Actually, in practice, the cycle lane will give emergency vehicles guaranteed space to stop; in emergencies.

      Not ideal for users, but emergencies are, well, emergencies, and they’ll happily give that space up for that use.

      Note the same does not hold for deliveries.

    2. This is how it would work in Europe. If the ambulance has to get through, cars make room in the middle of the road, mounting the kerb if necessary.

      And, just stating the obvious, there are a few a good reasons why you don’t see these big concrete barriers between cycle paths and the road. Emergency services is one thing, people accessing their garage is another. Usually you have just a kerb, or nothing at all. However the latter requires better behaved drivers than what we have here.

  7. I envisage a few cars, couriers etc stopping in that cycle lane to drop off people and parcels. Shouldn’t they install vertical plastic markers on the concrete strips to deter them doing it? In the rain and at night those concrete strips won’t stand out that much either.

  8. Thanks AT, this is a much needed improvement to Auckland’s walking and cycling network that provides an important linkage through a busy part of the city. Great to see it progressing this week!

  9. In the image above, how do you get off the cycleway and onto the pedestrian crossing? There are no exit ramps, no turning bay etc for bikes.

  10. Not going to argue the comments above properly, but will make two points.

    For every cyclist who would like to duck down side streets at will there will be at least one who only wants to enter it at the start or end of their journey.

    You build on one side, show the demand, and pretty soon there’s a clear case for building on two.

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