NZ In Tranzit

" Girl on a wall" Sculptor Clemen Pasch; Photographer Turelio. Installed 1979 Aachen, Germany. Wikimedia Commons Unbeknownst to the wabbit, his concern about the lack of designated mass rapid transit strategy in Christchurch (and therefore the inability of the present administrations to protect future busway and rail corridors) is being echoed in Auckland. Ok ok, the fluffy one's ego is big but not quite that big. Echo?? The flutter of a butterfly's wing made reverberate around the whole world but he doubts if the wave of his fluffy paw does. He won't even try to pass it off as "great minds think alike". Reality is you don't need an echo chamber or a big brain to see that the future must be planned and the bigger or more extended (including linear) the project is the greater the run up time must be. A week may be a long time in politics but a decade is a mere weekend when planning major infrastructure. The event to which I refer is reported in this ...

After Christopher Robin went to bed the stuffed wabbit awoke on the shelf. "Hey winnipeg wanna play trains?"  There was a loud snore, the sickly reek of stale honey on the bear's breath filled the room. "Well if he won't play I'll  gonna do it anyway" said the scraggly bunny, wide awake now, jumping down. He pulled out a map of Christchurch and  spread it on the floor and wound up the clockwork train.  "Hmm" he said, "What's going to work best with such a small population?" Yup a man who doesn't believe Christchurch can support commuter rail until it gets much bigger (or fuel goes up or some other pattern changes) has spent his weekend playing trains, just looking at some possibilities that rattle around in his head.  As the dream of commuter rail is an ongoing affair in Christchurch I have entered this as a "Page" - a permanent fixture on the sidebar that does not get buried under subsequent posti...

A Spring Stocktaking ........ It is now 12 months since I figured out how to make my first posting on NZ in Tranzit . Yes it's the talkative wabbit's birthday!  I suspect this may be boring to others but a time to do a spring stocktake for me ...hardened readers may find it of mild interest! Since September 23 2009  I have made 117 postings, not counting about a dozen entries on the "Pages". I get very little correspondence - about 50/50 online and privately, and about 50/50 junk mail/serious. In a way I suspected right from the start I wouldn't get much correspondence because such a high percentage of readers are probably employed in some way linked to public transport and it would be difficult to express opinions without compromising ones' job security or advancement. I luckily stand outside this, though with many casual and informal connections to various people and facets of local infrastructure and transit and a depth background in both...

This is "the Christchurch" that so many older people will remember best from the 1960s and 1970s  - cars, buses, cyclists, running right around the Square (and yes, even back then at nights, boy racers in modest amounts looping the loop - but not too much, being obvious prey for traffic cops). The United Services Hotel - background - had a cosmopolitan ambience that gave old fashion strength to the Square as a public place. Even the fire escapes in some curious way work with the design. With its huge limestone blocks (and a bit of strengthening) would it have weathered the recent Earthquake? The Catholic Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament of similar material and also strengthened is damaged but repairable. The removal of this landmark building about two decades ago did much to kill the Square as the "heart" of the city, the building that replaced it is not unattractive but completely lacking in the necessary presence for such a role. The BNZ has had a makeover...

Interestingly I was back in Sydenham again yesterday and I don't think any part of the city is so consistently ravaged as the old commercial heart of Sydenham. The whole street from Colombo Street overbridge to Brougham Street and Sydenham Park is like a maze - every bit one side or other of the street fenced by safety fences or a wall of protective containers and narrowed to one way passage. It is not only the new bus lanes being built (below) that are somewhat obstructed! The other side of this equation is that the damage is greatest because Sydenham still had a significant number of older - 19th century - shops, dating from its heyday as one New Zealand's most prosperous energetic towns.    Underlying this is not so much committed preservation as the economic decline of the northern end of Sydenham as the centre of commercial activity.  The home of most national chains and franchise has moved south of Brougham to the area opposite the park....

Wabbit doesn't normally do "news" (his last newshound scoop, news from 1962 was a tad past use-by-date) but loping home this afternoon he found a quiet suburban street blocked by army and police ....Christchurch gets more bizarre by the moment !!.....because a huge geyser had erupted. But rest assured dear local readers,  not a reawakening of the Lyttelton volcano (last eruption 5 million years ago or was it 12 million) - nope just a major water main playing havoc  - and I'll play newsboy [NZ "in-joke"]. No doubt the pipe has been stressed by the repeated earthquakes [a good kid's story -  "The big water pipe who couldn't" - "I just can't take anymore, I can't, I can't!!" gurgled the large concrete pipe "There. there dear you've wet yourself" said mummy earth, "And you've pissed all over me, you bloody little brat" she said throwing a large earthquake in disgust] . The pipe burst into o...

During the disruption to normal routes and services immediately  after the earthquake, I happened to end up at Sydenham Park at twilight, waiting to catch a bus northwards. I thought here is a good model of a potential bus transfer node point and had my camera so I took this photo . The first thing that strikes most readers looking at this will probably be nothing strikes them!  It is an extremely mundane view. Possibly the most boring sight in the Southern Hemisphere. Ok not quite that bad. This simple photo contains some KEY ELEMENTS of infrastructure for a successful integrated bus system.  In my thinking apart from about 6-9 major transfer stations such as The Palms and Westfield, Christchurch could one day have about 15-20 such "transfer nodes" type stops vaguely resembling the picture above. This stop, an instop, on the major multi-route corridor heading south from the Bus Exchange along Colombo Street Bus...

Correspondent Glen, (see last posting), has alerted me to this fabulous new invention   Amazingly it is born out of Christchurch by inventor Grant Ryan. And isn't it great it has received such strong backing from local innovation funding sources. Love the youtube ad, though a friend who saw one of these in operation wondered about the fairly high speed on pedestrian areas. I wonder too about balance and backpacks - not many people without a car travel without some sort of hand or back luggage. Perhaps if it becomes a popular form of transit it will also impact upon the shape and nature of public transport .

Christchurch (and NZ in Tranzit )  are very much on the move again. Although the possibility of strong after-shocks remains, the city of Christchurch is now getting extended periods between felt earthquakes. The old wabbit pokes his head out of his burrow but feels it a bit churlish to be rushing into critiques of this or that bus system for a day or two, so he's just saying hello to one and all.    The photo above,  a dinky little bicycle (well it does have two wheels) presumably powered by electricity he spotted zooting across Latimer Square the other day. I've never seen one before - does anyone know anything about this machine??   For those curious about the earthquake I enclose a few photos as a "Page" (see side bar). As the central city was cordoned off these do not show most of the larger buildings that came down in the earthquake, but does have a link to wikipedia and a very, very graphic earthquake and aftershock map. The photo below shows part...

As readers may be aware the city of Christchurch, New Zealand.  was hit by a 7.1 richter scale earthquake at 4.35 am yesterday morning. It lasted about 40 seconds, I think - it sure felt much longer being there!.  I live in a 150 year old non-reinforced two storey brick house! Being upstairs in an older brick house being shaken like it was in the jaws of a dog, kneeling in the dark because it was too hard to stand, with the frenzied shaking and with the roar and clatter of our huge old Victorian chimneys disintegrating  is not a recommended experience!  But allelujiah the wabbit lives!! An even more amazingly so does everyone else in Christchurch! Astounding given that about 500 plus buildings are damaged and 90 inner city buildings (mainly heritage ones and old character buildings are severely damaged, some semi-collapsed no one was killed and only two people severely injured! As we are getting constant and often sharp after shocks I am ke...

LANES BLOCKED..... Obstructing the Tramway . Charles H. Lewis was charged with having on April 2 wilfully, and without lawful excuse driven upon the line of the Canterbury Tramway Company, Limited, such tramway being authorised under the provisions of the Tramways Act, 1872, there remaining "in such a manner and for such a time as to obstruct a carriage using the tram way." Mr Cowlishaw appeared for the company, and Mr Stringer for the defendant. J. Evans Brown, Chairman of the Company, produced the order in Council authorising the line, and the deed of concession between tho City Council and the Company. The line had been duly inspected and reported fit for traffic. John Smith, guard employed by the Company, deposed that he was with the 4.40 train going along Colombo street. At the loop line by Montgomery's they were stopped, defendant being on the line with a brake and a pair of horses. He declined to move, although several times requested to do so, and notwithstand...