A dream of roads for rail and streets for people

I love my life. I can leave my apartment and it’s an easy walk away from Karangahape Road, Commercial Bay, or Ponsonby. I can walk to the Auckland Domain or Albert Park, or Myers Park. I can go and catch a bus or train to so many places outside of the City Centre. I save so much money not having to own a car. So much time not having to think about parking or driving in traffic. My apartment might be small, but it’s my home and all the things I could ever need are so accessible. I do wonderful things for work and know and meet so many amazing people. And so much of that is the result of where I live, the places I visit, and how this corner of Auckland has been designed. Often as a result of people I may never meet, but who put their blood sweat and tears into improving things one step at a time. I love so many things about Auckland, and I honestly didn’t know my roots dug this deep until I was thinking about leaving last year.

But I can also picture in my mind how it could be even better. How our streets could be made for people. How our roads can go from being congestion-riddled messes, to the smooth glide of modern rail transit. And for a long time I’ve been thinking about how to do this. How do we make our corner of the world a better place? How do we take what we know, from the evidence, works. How we do take what we know in our hearts and brains to be good. How do we convince others of this vision? To improve the lives of not just ourselves but everyone around us. Our families, our friends, our communities. Even the strangers we might only pass once in our lives. Even our descendants we may never meet or who may never know us.

Sometimes we can have all the facts and evidence in the world and yet we cannot change a thing. While facts and evidence are so, so incredibly important, they only work when someone knows you. When someone trusts you. When they connect with you. Most people, including myself as much as I might sometimes think otherwise, don’t connect with numbers and statistics, peer reviewed papers, and longitudinal studies. How many times do we need to talk about induced demand for people to understand that adding just one more lane isn’t going to solve congestion?

The thing is, something like “induced demand” doesn’t mean anything to someone who is just living their life, working their job, hanging with their friends, and loving their family. Because what they connect with are stories and experience. We see and hear people and things in our everyday life, and so we believe them.

And so, when we are in streets filled with people coming together in joy and celebration, we connect with that. When roads lead to rail, those visiting and living in the West Island feel the transformation that envelops the space into a party. We can tell stories about that. We can share that experience with others. Share with them that connection to a better world that we know is possible.

And when things are dark, darker than ever before, the stories we tell each other are what gets us to the dawn. They warm our soul and bodies in the cold nights, now and from back when we lived in caves. In many ways, the last stage of one major darkness looms over our city centre, yet the reason it is so dark is because the dawn is brighter than it ever has been. We have so many incredible stories, both near and far, of transformation, change, and success. We offer hope when we share those stories with those who are skeptical. Those friends who start to wonder what we are on about when we sing the praises of our places. And we dance the praises of walking and cycling. When we dream the praises of trains to come.

One spark for this post is that I’ve been reading Emily Wilson’s acclaimed new translation of The Iliad, a story thousands of years old. One thing that struck me was the translator’s introduction, in which Wilson describes how much the ancient story came to mean to her in how she lived her own life. How she saw the world. How she felt about it. And how she shared that with her friends and family, to laughter and tears.

In ways that are often hard to articulate but run through everything, my work has been deeply informed by my own experiences. I have been reading Homer throughout my adult life. Whenever I hear blustering winds and rainstorms, surging rivers or choppy seas, when I watch a flock of geese of a swooping hawk, when I walk though rustling woods or up a mountainside, I know I am inside the world of Homeric similes. Even the most trivial moments of daily life remind me of Homer. I notice that my feet are not “well-oiled” whenever I tie my sandals on. I cannot watch my dog happily rolling in mulch without thinking of Achilles, prostrated by grief and tossing around in the dust. More seriously, the poem gives me a language to understand my deepest emotions and those of people around me. When I weep for my mother, who died recently in a distant land, I remember the grief of Achilles and of Priam. The Iliad is with me always. My own life, as a parent, a child, and a human being, has taught me to understand the poem more deeply.

Ashes, one of my favorite songs by one of my favourite bands, The Longest Johns, muses about how those who fiercely want to keep something the same as it was in the past can inadvertently let it die out, instead of carrying it forward.

The stories we have are what carry us forward. But they are never the same, and cannot be the same as what once was. That translation of The Iliad was done in such a way in order to bring the story to the modern audience. It changed, to bring it forward for everyone to enjoy and not just sit in an ivy tower in a drift of academical dust.

If we collectively, as The Longest Johns sing, decide to worship our ashes of cars and highways, we will not carry forward into the future. We will instead blow away in the next wind, our minds still unable to move on. We need to tend to the fire of something different.

And so this is my contribution, what I hope can be a spark for that fire. My story to pass on to those who wish to listen. Because I love this city. I love Auckland. I love this country. I love Aotearoa New Zealand. I love this world. The small blue marble in an endless expanse of the universe. I love the places and people in our city.

And I dream for children I hope to have to be able to roam free, independent, safe from the dangers they would currently face by delivering good design and transformation. I dream for efficient, reliable, public transport, so I can go to even more places in our city on time, and everyone can access the part that is my home without congestion. I dream for us to to have choices in which to travel, in ways free from polluting emissions and destruction, so the air we breathe is clear and the planet does not burn. I dream for the green of trees and plants and the blue of water uncovered, to make our urban jungle cool, lively, and calming. I dream for our places to be beautiful, to have soul through art, sculptures, fountains and more. I dream for people to fill our streets, to connect, and bring life and party. I dream for trains and bikes and buses and a nice pair of walking shoes, and the paths and rail track and routes to support this.

These dreams are possible, and they are stories we can tell, they are conversations we can have with those around us.

They say all roads lead to Rome; in my mind, all roads lead to rail. To cool and wonderful trains both light and heavy. Right now, one of the stories we all accept is that streets lead to cars. But for me? They don’t. Not any more. Streets lead to people. As they once did so long ago. Because that’s the story I’m going to tell, to believe is possible. To see that vision in front of me. To dream this story into reality for the better world I want to see. But I don’t want this dream, this story, to just be my own.

This is my challenge to you. To dream of a different world and tell that story far and wide. To friends and family. Tell them your story of how you want a better world, a better city, a greater Auckland. Yes, have your evidence and facts on hand, as we so often discuss – but mostly, talk about how it will transform your life. Tell stories of how riding a bike through the city the first time changed your life. Tell them when you were late to work because the bus got stuck in traffic as there was no bus lane and how much it would change your life to have that. Tell them how your places were changed to focus on people, the community you found and the friends you made. Tell stories of when you were overseas, or in another city, or wherever and whoever you found inspiration and made these stories of your own. Tell stories of what works, what doesn’t, and what you want to see changed. Tell these stories over and over again.

And if you don’t yet have a story of your own? If mine connects with you, then share that. If others share their own stories and dreams in the comments, share them. Share your connection and experience with those you are connected with and have experiences with. Those you trust, and those who trust you. Now and in the future. Because when we do this, when we build those connections and create that shared story, that shared dream, we change things. We change minds. We change the world from what it is. We ensure it lives on to the future instead of turning to ash. We ensure the flame continues burning in these cold dark nights until our dreams of light comes to pass. Because we all have that power.

And eventually, I believe all roads will lead to rail. And all streets will lead to people. And we will have the city, the country, the world, we dream of.

But only if we share that dream.

And only if we each tell that story.

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