It’s Friday and time for another roundup of things that caught our attention this week.
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This week in Greater Auckland
- On Monday Patrick looked at the idea for a new central rail station in Hamilton
- On Tuesday Matt took a look at our road safety record for 2024.
Rail Replacement Buses
There are a number of problems with rail replacement buses and two of them have been on display this week as a lot more people head back to work.
Capacity
There were a number of reports on Monday that rail replacement buses were too busy.
Rail replacement buses in Auckland were packed on Monday morning as many in the city returned to work at the same time as a network-wide shutdown.
One Western line replacement bus just after 7.30am was 10 minutes late and full by the time it reached Glen Eden, which is the fifth stop towards Britomart.
Two stops later, the driver was forced to continue past bus stops and ignore waiting passengers.
Routes
Rail buses also take a more circuitous route, which combined with traffic and navigating intersections makes them much slower than trains. Even worse when they get stuck a level crossing that no train using.
The Herald reports that one bus got stuck at a level crossing despite the network being shut down.
A passenger on a rail replacement bus had to get off and direct traffic so the bus could navigate through closed barrier arms at a level crossing in West Auckland this morning – despite no trains currently running on Auckland’s rail network.
The bus was was stuck for at least 20 minutes during rush hour at the crossing on Fruitvale Rd in West Auckland before a “saviour” hopped off and asked cars behind to move so that the bus could reverse and make its way around the barrier arms.
…..
Adam Olszewski, KiwiRail’s infrastructure operations manager for Auckland metro and greater Auckland, confirmed that there was an issue this morning with the barrier arms at the Fruitvale Rd level crossing which has since been resolved.
Having caught rail replacement buses through this section a few times it seems odd that AT don’t just run the buses down Gt North Rd rather than winding them through local streets lined with speed bumps and parked cars that make it difficult for two buses to pass each other, all to get the bus to stop right by the station. It would be an extra few hundred metres walk for some people but would speed up this section of route quite a bit and make it more reliable for everyone not going to Fruitvale Rd.
Light on Communication
Sticking with AT, their usual lack of comms/engagement means this “surprise” will just have poured more gasoline on the fires of the usual haters of the Pt Chev and Meola Rd upgrade.
Frustrated residents who hoped the end of more than a year of roadworks on a busy suburban Auckland road was in sight are irate that more construction is in the works.
Auckland Transport (AT) says it’s working to make Pt Chevalier, Meola and Garnet Rds “safer and more accessible and efficient”.
To do this, it will install traffic lights at the Meola Rd, Garnet Rd and William Denny Ave roundabout in Westmere to turn it into a “metered roundabout”, a letter sent to affected residents said.
The lights will only be for traffic driving north on Garnet Rd, and will be intermittently active when sensors detect a backlog of traffic on Meola Rd trying to get through the roundabout.
…..
AT said traffic queues have existed at the roundabout for years – before it began working in the area – and pointed to a public feedback report from July 2020 in which some submitters called for improvements.
AT told the Herald that introducing metering at the roundabout would help improve overall traffic flow.
…..
“The traffic light will only be active when it is needed on weekday mornings when there are long queues of peak traffic on Meola Rd, making it quicker and easier for those drivers to enter the roundabout. At all other times, the roundabout will function as normal.
Roundabout metering helps balance traffic flow at each point entering the roundabout. It has already been successful in other parts of Auckland.”
We’re aware of this design being used on other roundabouts, like the SH2/Elizabeth St roundabout in Tauranga, but we’re not aware of it being used in Auckland.
Sigh. Another AT comms fail. The metering (similar to the lights at motorway on-ramps at peak times) actually aims to address a longstanding problem, but AT's "one more thing" approach to info just gives license to every angry rando in the local FB group – who will then be quoted by the Herald.
— Russell Brown (@publicaddress.bsky.social) 2025-01-16T02:41:50.910Z
Journey Planner
Auckland Transport’s online journey planner appears to have been compromised, with a rude phrase appearing in the search engine of the website.
When one types a destination in the starting point search bar of the journey planner, the phrase “I suck cock” comes up in the results portal.
Perhaps their comms team were too busy coming up with this reply to deal with the Garnet/Meola roundabout properly
Auckland Transport’s online journey planner appears to have been compromised, with a rude phrase appearing in the search engine of the website.
When one types a destination in the starting point search bar of the journey planner, the phrase “I suck cock” comes up in the results portal.
Fences Gone
One last thing from AT, it seems someone is stealing their fences.
Auckland Transport has slammed the “appalling” theft of safety fencing, which could cost ratepayers $75,000 to replace.
About 76 fence panels have been stolen from around the North Shore, including 60 from a newly built retaining wall on Gills Rd in Albany and 10 from the recently repaired Glenvar Rd in Torbay.
The fences had been installed on the ridge roads for the safety of pedestrians.
“The appalling theft of these panels has put the public’s safety at risk, as these fences were protecting pedestrians from the drop-off of a steep embankment,” said Upper Harbour Local Board member Uzra Casuri Balouch.
Christchurch gets its wheels on
Cycling in Christchurch is at an all-time high, with more than 4 million trips clocked in 2024.
The Christchurch City Council’s cycle counter logged a record-breaking 4.08 million counts across the 31 locations.
“It’s great to see our network of cycleways being well used, with the number steadily increasing year on year from 3.8 million in 2023 and 3.6 million in 2022,” head of transport Lynette Ellis said.
“February was the stand-out month, with 405,000 trips clocked – the highest month since March 2021 and also the shortest month of the year.”
Another significant milestone was achieved when the counter on the Antigua Street Bridge near Christchurch Hospital recorded 500,000 trips for the year for the first time ever.
“Hagley Park is a hive of cyclist activity. There are three cycle counters around Hagley Park, with each averaging around 420,000 cyclists counted per year,” Ellis said.
Locals fighting for safety
Locals in Coatsville have been fighting for years to get a pedestrian crossing installed.
How does the pedestrian cross the road? It took five years and several changes for authorities to get to the answer, and even then a cost blowout has left the funding uncertain.
In 2019, and in response to community concerns, the Rodney Local Board said a solution was needed to slow down traffic and give pedestrians a safe place to cross the main road in the Coatesville village, in Auckland’s north-west.
Coatesville Residents and Ratepayers Association chairperson Jacqui Cantell said a crossing of some sort was needed due to there being a dairy, pony club, cafe, garage, offices, and two childcare centres along the busy stretch of road.
“There are a lot of comings and goings and no safe way for people to cross the road,” Cantell said.
It includes some classic bureaucratic time wasting
In 2023, the board opted for the raised zebra crossing, before AT informed members it couldn’t support it because the road had a 60kph speed limit.
The board, in mid-2024, instead decided to go with the traffic light crossing, as this was better than doing nothing, deputy chairperson Louise Johnston told Stuff.
But a new land transport rule introduced in October 2024 meant the NZ Transport Agency’s director of land transport could lower a speed limit if “there is good reason”.
In a memo to the local board, acting director of land transport Mike Hargreaves found there was strong support to lower the speed limit to 50kph, so a raised pedestrian crossing could be built.
“This will create a safe place for people to cross a busy road,” Hargreaves said.
It was now late 2024, and the Rodney board decided to revert to the original preferred option of a raised zebra crossing with a lower gradient than a typical speed table, after receiving feedback from the Coatesville Residents and Ratepayers Association.
At this point, the cost of the project had risen, exceeding the $200,000 which AT had agreed to contribute – by a further $125,000. AT was yet to decide whether it would approve the additional budget.
“The scope of the project covers significantly more than the raised crossing itself, and includes reinstating footpaths, rebuilding road kerbs and channels, drainage works, improved street lighting and line marking,” an AT spokesperson said.
How the minister will react. He says he’s all for locals having more say in these decisions but also he’s against raised crossings.
French Squiggle
Momentum Mag takes a look at an idea from the mayor of a small French town who was trying to slow cars down.
In a bid to combat speeding and ensure safety, the picturesque French village of Baune, near the city of Angers, has resorted to the unconventional method of what can best be described as a squiggle road. Frustrated by the inability of traditional traffic signs to slow down drivers in their 30km/h (19mph) zone, local officials decided to paint peculiar squiggly lines on the road surface.
These seemingly abstract road markings, resembling something of an art project, were introduced following concerns over motorists consistently breaking the speed limit within the village. According to Baune’s mayor, Audrey Revereault, the aim is to “create a visual disturbance” for drivers and encourage them to reduce their speed. Surprisingly, this novel approach appears to be working, with drivers successfully adhering to the speed limit.
Jean-Charles Prono, the mayor of Loire-Authion, a group of seven villages that includes Baune, expressed the difficulty of slowing down fast drivers and the need for effective solutions. He mentioned that the goal is to “make it difficult to read the landscape,” thereby forcing drivers to pay closer attention to the road.
Melbourne’s Free Trams
The Guardian has a look at the impacts of Melbourne’s trams being free in the city centre for the past decade.
A decade on, Bowen, who is a spokesperson for the Public Transport Users Association (PTUA), says his predictions have come true.
“It has definitely caused more problems than it solved,” he says. “The trams are more crowded than ever. They are slower than ever. It is definitely not an upgrade for those paying customers.”
Over the years, several experts have also questioned the effectiveness of the free tram zone, including Infrastructure Victoria, which called for it to be scrapped in 2020.
But the zone, which extends from Queen Victoria Market to Docklands, Spring Street, Flinders Street station and Federation Square, remains hugely popular with tourists and visitors to the CBD.
…..
The department said when the free tram zone was introduced, the number of trips taken within the CBD almost doubled from 18.5m trips a year to 35.5m.
The majority of this increase was attributed to commuters taking “short tram journeys” instead of walking.
Yarra Trams said this surge in patronage “harmed the operational efficiency, comfort, passenger satisfaction, and farebox income of tram services” and forced trams to slow down throughout the CBD.
Dr Crystal Legacy, an associate professor of urban planning at the University of Melbourne, says the free tram zone went against one of the key objectives of a high-quality public transport system.
“The whole point of these sorts of incentives is to try to get people out of their cars and on to public transport,” she says. “Instead, we’ve seen a shift away from people walking short distances.”
Bowen argues it has also led to more cars around the city. He says the PTUA is aware of commuters driving to the edge of the free tram zone to take a tram for the remainder of their trip.
New York’s Congestion Pricing is working
It’s still only a couple of weeks old but all indications are that congestion pricing in New York is working.
The first week of congestion pricing bucked the years-long trend of increased bridge and tunnel traffic into Manhattan’s Central Business District, initial crossing data show.
Morning commuter times last Wednesday, Jan. 8, dropped year-over-year on every bridge or tunnel into the tolling zone below 60th Street, the MTA told reporters on Monday — with an average drop of 34 percent between the eight crossings.
There are blocks of lower Manhattan that are so devoid of cars now it’s wild.
There is one business who is suffering though.
Gregg Reuben, chief executive of parking-management firm Centerpark, which operates 35 garages in Manhattan, said the number of customers has dropped 20% since congestion pricing went into effect. Centerpark operates parking garages inside and outside of the congestion zone and has seen a drop-off in business at all locations, he said.
“I don’t believe we will fully recover that 20% loss,” Reuben said.
There were quite a few other things we could have included in here. Was there anything that stood out to you?
Does anyone have details about the Lockydock trial in Auckland Central? Heard it was meant to go up in December but no sign of any action as of yet!
“To do this, it will install traffic lights at the Meola Rd, Garnet Rd and William Denny Ave roundabout in Westmere to turn it into a “metered roundabout”, a letter sent to affected residents said.
The lights will only be for traffic driving north on Garnet Rd, and will be intermittently active when sensors detect a backlog of traffic on Meola Rd trying to get through the roundabout.”
Re:
“We’re aware of this design being used on other roundabouts, like the SH2/Elizabeth St roundabout in Tauranga, but we’re not aware of it being used in Auckland.”
Is this just not the same as the Mahia Rd/Coxhead Rd roundabout?
https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-37.036085,174.8952718,3a,41.5y,238.06h,89.3t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1si1l8vHykEHV_1x9QsbUYiw!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D0.6982606456545%26panoid%3Di1l8vHykEHV_1x9QsbUYiw%26yaw%3D238.06388896639316!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDExMC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
There is also one in East Auckland, at the intersection of Whitford Rd, Somerville Rd, and Point View Dr: https://tinyurl.com/4b7t7yd8
Also at the Airport; the roundabout at Tom Pearce Drive/Jimmy Ward Cres.
Apollo Dr and Rosedale Rd has one on the shore
There’s also one at Cascades Rd/Aviemore Drive – https://maps.app.goo.gl/s9AGmSjmu1gCAq7D6
Why wasn’t this done during all the other works?
There’s also one by Mount Eden Prison.
There’s also one on the Silverdale overbridge triggered by northbound offramp queues (or at least there was when I lived up that way a decade ago)
And Queenstown Rd interchange with SW motorway.
I think one of the team here suggested one approaching Mill Rd?
There are several roundabouts on Mill Rd, none of which have traffic lights. There’s another roundabout in Manurewa that leads to Mill Rd, but that also isn’t metered. The Porchester Rd roundabouts are similarly unmetered.
From the Manukau end I can’t think of any roundabouts at all. But I am less familiar with that bit.
There is a pedestrian crossing traffic light on Walters Rd just before it joins Cosgrave/Mill, might that be what you’re thinking of?
SH1 offramp at Silverdale
Signal metering at roundabouts is a well established method of improving capacity without requiring road widening. It can be used where unbalanced flows do not provide the small breaks needed to allow delayed arms to enter – the opposite to the way motorway ramp metering works.
It also allows for on-call pedestrian crossings to be combined with metering. This is especially important in the rarer cases where multi-lane entries are needed.
There just have not been enough cases in Auckland where a change to metered entry has been justified so far. Slowing entry and circulating speeds with single-lane entries usually provides efficient and safe operation without metering, although many roundabouts are capable of having metered entry added if congestion becomes a problem. This appears to be something that the Mayor hasn’t looked into yet.
There are already several roundabouts where metering has been installed. So it has been an option in the toolbox for AT.
Very nice to get off a dirty clunky smelly Southern line rail bus and onto a quiet smooth eastern line electric rail bus.
And here is the only thing using the Western Line at this time ;-
and heading back into the Auckland network late into the Evening
And here is the latest from AT concerning Fare increases
New prices for your travel
Each year, fares are reviewed to keep up with the costs of running, maintaining and investing in Auckland’s public transport network. Starting 2 February, we’ll need to increase fares by an average of 5.2% p.a. Adult HOP fares, using an AT HOP card or contactless payments, will increase between 15 and 25 cents per journey on buses, trains and between 20 cents and $1.40 per journey on ferries.
more here ;-
https://e.at.govt.nz/mail/view/9p_5fkbzhz34fdbc13gmfr_rzd05bzy1ct3ck_vdj88jkmchz020mc2xldz527l992l9226y65sq1nky354sb
Oh wow, they also get rid of the off-peak discount 🙁
Not a big fan of this and I wonder if it will lead to more people on the bus before 9am and fewer on the later busses.
$50 fare cap remains, which means I’m not impacted.
I suggest, as a protest, every Aucklander does enough trips to exceed the fare cap. Hit AT in the pocket. That’ll show ’em! lol
If the solution to having too many people on trams is to stop it being free…then do we apply that logic to too much traffic on the roads? Nah, its always build more roads!
Can’t we apply the road logic to the trams, and build more?
Another important thing I only read about this week (although article from last year) was that KiwiRail has already announced the scheduled shutdowns for 2025.
The summer holidays from 26 December to 27 January 2025
Easter and term one holidays from 12 to 27 April
King’s Birthday from 30 May to 2 June
Matariki from 20 to 23 June
Labour weekend from 24 to 27 October
Summer holidays from 20 December to 26 January 2026
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/537619/auckland-rail-shutdown-begins-what-you-need-to-know
I look forward to the ending of summer shut downs. KiwiRail must realise that they can’t keep doing it forever.
Here is something I posted a while back with the calendar of the shutdown dates ;-
Bit of clear anti-AT bias coming through this week. Rather than taking the reporter to task for seeming to not know the difference between a signalised intersection and a metered roundabout it is listed as an AT comms failure. Has anyone checked if this letter wasnt actually the consultation on this idea rather than implying it was a notification of imminent roadworks. (It’s probably the former since there is no evidence of this being an approved project at this site.)
Slightly off topic – but does anyone have any information about whether there are plans to construct the third platform at Puhinui before CRL opens?
Seems bizarre that Te Huia and any future Southern express wouldn’t be able to utilise the full length of the third main to avoid conflicts with Manakau services while also stopping at Puhinui.
In that sense it seems more integral to post-CRL and third main operations than the third platform at Henderson. Big return on tiny investment given the passive provision for it.
It’s good they had some express rail buses this year I must say. I’m guessing easier/only possible while there are more spare buses about with schools been off etc. Yes, they could streamline that bus stop for Fruitvale.
The rail replacement buses are bonkers past New Lynn even the express.
The 18 is quicker in morning traffic in getting to midtown despite the lies the AT app tell you.
What we 9-5 CBD workers really need is an 18X when the trains are off.