This is a guest blog from CAA Associate, Bryce P.
If you would like to submit a guest blog, please feel free to email Ben L at goosoid@gmail.com. We love getting guest blogs about what is happening in your neighbourhood or an aspect of cycling you are passionate about.
Over the weekend of the 29th and 30th of March, Bike Te Atatu made a short film based around cycling in Te Atatu.
The spirit of this short film is to show just what we have in Te Atatu but also what we could have in Te Atatu and indeed Auckland using well known techniques from overseas.
While driving into Te Atatu, I knew we were doing the right thing as I came across this full to capacity bike rack at the Luscious Food Store. These guys have got into the cycling culture bit and offer a 10% drink discount to people who turn up on bikes.
Jemma, Laura and Andrew were the main ‘crew’ and started with some casual shots of people riding around town.
One of the key things that has had a lot of airtime recently in blogs and twitter posts is protected cycleways. So, how do we get a protected cycway when we actually don’t really have any? Luckily for us the good people from Fulton Hogan, (yes the same Fulton Hogan who are the contractors for the Te Atatu interchange rebuild and who are bringing us an underpass on the NW cycleway) are a nice bunch of people and arranged necessary traffic permits, traffic control and bollards to install along 100m or so of a local street. I can now tell you from experience that, although the bollards were merely sitting on the road surface, there was an immediate feeling of safety in knowing you had your own lane. It even felt safe to ride the wrong way, such is the power of the cheap old bollard.
Next up we mocked up a 30 km/h neighbourhood slow zone. There’s not much to say about this other than there are many already traffic calmed streets in Auckland that could easily be made to look like this tomorrow. How many km’s of cycle safe streets would that add for very little cost?
From there, we made a quick detour to the Te Atatu Peninsula Primary gala day for some more general footage. Luckily in Te Atatu we have the services of an Auckland Transport employee – Simon Vincent. He is awesome and always turns up to events with bike stands, little giveaways and a free bike check.
We finished Saturday with another residential slow zone. Everyone loves this idea.
On Sunday, the team added a professional sound recordist (Craig, another local who donated his time and equipment) for a day of interviews with Te Atatu people who cycle for various reasons. We even managed to get that famous nano scientist Michelle Dickinson
For one of these interviews, I was asked to make an appearance as a 30 km/h street sceptic. As someone who feels strongly that these are a great idea, I’m not too sure how convincing I was. Jemma seemed to think I’d done ok.
All up it was a great weekend and we’re all eagerly awaiting to see the finished results. No doubt Jemma and Laura are editing furiously while I write this. We’ll let you all know where to view it once it’s ready. A final thanks to Jemma, Laura, Andrew and everyone who contributed.
