Why Carmageddon never comes
The fear associated with even temporary reductions in road capacity in Auckland is often so extreme that this report from Joe Cortright in City Observatory, Why Carmaggedon never comes (Seattle edition), is worth drawing to everyone’s attention. It takes the example of the closure for demolition of the Alaskan Way, a 3.5km, double stacked, 6-lane, fugly as, harbour-severing, 1940s fly-over in Seattle, to illustrate a well observed feature of city traffic.…
64 Comments Moving more cars
It’s mid-January and many of us probably wish we could still be out enjoying the sun rather than sitting in an office (for those of us who work in offices). With people back at work, also back is Auckland’s traffic, not that it effects me as I breeze past it on the Northern Busway enjoying the view from the top of a double decker.…
New Albert St video, same design problem
The most contentious issue with the City Rail Link these days is how Albert St will be reinstated following all of the construction works. It’s important we get it right and time is short given the trench is already starting to be refilled.…
Rural highway conundrums
Transport spending, like everything else, is all about trade-offs. There are a lot of improvements to be made and only a limited pot of funding from which do them and so those improvements need to be prioritised. One of the most urgent priorities is to improving safety.…
Ongoing New Year’s Eve debacles symptom of a bigger problem
Despite some very small and (seemingly) reluctant steps by Auckland Transport to close off parts of the city centre to traffic on New Year’s Eve, there was still a dangerous and very messy situation with cars mingling with thousands of revellers as midnight approached: @AklTransport @AklCouncil @AklDesignChamp @DarbyatCouncil Happy New Year all, looking forward to a great 2019.…
2019 – The year ahead
With 2019 now underway, and following my wrap up of 2018 last week, I thought it would be good to look at some of the things we can expect from the year ahead. In no particular order.
City Rail Link
At the end of April the builder of the tunnels and stations is expected to be announced.…
Flashback Wednesday – The Grafton Gully Multiway Boulevard
Over the holiday break we’ll dig into the archives a bit. This post by Matt was originally published in July 2014.
On Wednesday Kent presented a plan to the Waitemata Local Board for dramatically improving one of the worst corridors in the central city – Stanley St and The Strand.…
2018 – A Year in Review
With 2018 drawing to a close, I thought I’d pull together a quick post wrapping up the most important things that happened during the year.
Thank you to everyone who has visited the blog and supported us in making Auckland greater.…
Flashback Thursday – The mystery of the Wellsford-Whangarei business case
Over the summer break we’re digging into the archives. This post by Matt was originally published in August 2017 and is particularly relevant to some current debate.
It’s been a crazy few weeks, and the last week especially since the launch of our Regional Rapid Rail, which has been quickly adopted by both Labour and the Greens.…
New Years Eve the perfect time to trial Queen Street pedestrianisation
In late November, the council voted to proceed with investigating a plan that would reshape the city centre to focus on pedestrians rather than cars. One especially exciting development was the addition of the following motions, at the behest of councilors:
c) endorse the use of trials and “tactical urbanism” initiatives in order to test and consult on the initiatives in clause b) ii) and iii) above
d) request staff to trial an “open streets” initiative in the City Centre and work with interested Local Boards to trial it in other centres
We have many ideas about how where these trials could take place and it is great to see a trial of High Street proceeding yesterday, as part of the “Late Night Christmas” street festival, thanks to Heart of the City.…
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