The (really good) Auckland Motorway Strategic Plan
Waka Kotahi/NZTA has released an important new document for our region: the Auckland Motorway Strategic Plan (AMSP), which is fully endorsed by the Minister of Transport Chris Bishop and Mayor of Auckland Wayne Brown.
It’s really very good; comprehensive and reality-based.…
65 Comments Richer or poorer?
Patrick Reynolds is deputy chair of the City Centre Advisory Panel, and a previous director of Waka Kotahi/NZTA.
Recently there has been some good attention on New Zealand’s relatively low productivity. Just last week the Mayor led on this issue: Brown stressed that Auckland’s economic future relies on shifting from low productivity and long hours to high-value, scalable innovation.…
Who benefits from secrecy around public infrastructure?
You might have seen this video, which we received as part of a recent OIA request. It showcases the original light rail plans developed by Auckland Transport between 2014-2017.
The video was apparently produced in early 2018 by Auckland Transport, just a few months before the project was handed off to Waka Kotahi/NZTA.…
Staging the Northwestern
As described here, Auckland is in the middle of a multi-decade process of retro-fitting a Strategic Rapid Transit Network (RTN) to the city.
The process used to date for this is best described as incremental. All of our current RTN began very much below the ideal standard but have been more-or less constantly improved since.…
Auckland Strategic Roading Network Projects
With the change in Government, we are likely to see PT/Walking/Cycling prioritised over the many roading projects National wanted. However, it is likely and in some circumstances necessary for Government to make some investments to take place in our strategic roading network during the first decade 2018 – 2028.…
Houston, we have a problem
This is a Guest Post by Wellington Architect and regular reader Guy Marriage
For quite some time now, Demographia has been touting Houston, Texas, as the way forward for New Zealand, and especially Auckland, to copy their stunningly low housing construction costs.…
How to Un Moses your City – Auckland
Recently there was an interesting article called how to Un Moses your City at Citylab. For those unfamiliar with the name, Robert Moses was one of the most polarising men in Urban Planning, leading much of New York City’s infrastructure planning during the depression and post-war period.…
Kapiti Expressway stage one: Review
This is a guest post by architect and our occassional Wellington correspondent Guy Marriage
The first section of the Kapiti Expressway opened on 24 February, at 4am, with little fanfare. As an immediate response to this implicit request, that induced me to make some more traffic by driving up and down the new road, just to see what it is like.…
50 Years of waiting for an Auckland Rapid Transit system.
My father, Ian Reynolds 1922-2005, was an architect (as was my mother). He was also a what was then called a Town and Country Planner. After returning from working in England after the war he spent the rest of his career as partner in a big multidisciplinary practice in Auckland (missing the city of his youth: Wellington.…
Do motorways inevitably generate economic growth?
There were a number of odd things in the report released several weeks ago by the New Zealand Council for Infrastructure Development (NZCID), a lobby group. Matt has already reviewed the report in detail. Perhaps the oddest part of it was this sentence:
Motorway capacity is essential because motorways generate economic activity.…
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