NZ In Tranzit

Following release of the Christchurch Central City (post earthquake rebuild)Transport Plan it has become clear that the city council is prepared to support having certain streets giving priority to a particular mode of transport. Rather than the private car and commercial vehicle being king and queen of every road and street - with bike lanes and bus lanes squashed into one side - this strategy will see wide pedestrian or  bus or cycling lanes, taking priority in some central city streets. See official map below NZ in Tranzit believes this is an excellent concept and should also be carried into the inner suburbs and even city wide, on a select number of streets. Indeed this blogster believes the city should create a concept called "Green Roads" - these are not just a single street, but a number of streets that can be linked together (sometimes by off road segregated corridors) to create attractive corridors in which private cars and commercial vehicles are ...

Jarrett Walker - Human Transit blog - must have leaned out of the conference room  window to capture such a iconic photograph of Wellington buses! Here threading along  Manners Street, a bus only section of Wellington CBD city's narrow streets. A study by international engineering and transport consultants AECOM has identified a Bus Rapid Transit system from Wellington Railway Station to Newtown, and to Kilbirnie, as the most effective mode of meeting expected growth in Wellington public transport use on this primary transport spine. The relative costs were Bus Priority upgrade $59 million; Bus Rapid Transit $207 million (both systems direct to either Newtown or Kilbirnie) and Light Rail $989 million, to Newtown only (with feeder buses to Kilbirnie etc.)* A pamphlet outlining the study finding (or indeed the whole report )  is available to read here, and has inevitably produced a lot of debate and perhaps also some justified criticism.   Almo...

Noosa Bus Station, Queensland just after completion, stylish and spacious  (photo displayed on the website of  designers Guymer-Bailey Landscape Architects, Brisbane )  (a link to further  photos of this project below) I have made a submission to the proposed Riccarton Road transfer station consultation. As there is a very big chance this submission will be deemed outside the terms of reference of the review, and not even viewed,  I share here publicly some of the aspects raised. If nothing else, it is good to share a range of more realistic options for better public transport. This submission suggested the "Smart Way" concept ( previously raised on this blog ) of building a mostly segregated busway corridor parallel to Riccarton Road from (at least) Mandeville Street to Wharenui Road and possibly (or later) Middleton Road.  On-street Bus lanes would operate between the railway crossing and Mandeville Street, and between Wharenui Road ...

This is a photo taken yesterday,  Sunday 10 November 2013, from a bus window, of two Orbiter buses ostensibly operating in  a service where departures are 15 minutes apart .  Anyone who lives in Christchurch knows that a double-dipping of lime buses is a common sight. This next photo was taken over three years earlier, on 12 August 2010  - note before any earthquakes - it is an image of what a weekday Orbiter service, ostensibly running at ten minute intervals, can look like on RealTime sign.  Reading between these tightly packed lines we can see that some poor bastards here, and down the line, will or have been waiting 30 minutes for this ten minute service! In Christchurch we have a bus system that has proved chronically unable to use its advanced monitoring technology, or to develop   operating strategies , roading controls etc  to keep a scheduled service running at even intervals, and arriving and departing at desig...