Some of us recently had the chance to hear Richard Barter – long-time champion of transport cycling and chair of the Puketapapa Local Board – speak to the Auckland Transport Board.
CAA was delighted that Richard’s Board was making their Greenways project the centrepiece of their submission. Even ahead of discussing Dominion Road, buses and future rail links, the Board sought AT’s support for their plan to connect their greenspaces with high-quality walking and cycling links. See their whole plan below.
The image at the right shows the proposed Greenways network (click through twice to get the large version). You can also see two links that the Board wants to see built soonest:
- one route linking the Mount Roskill Intermediate school area westwards to the off-road paths that already exist in Walsmley Park and War Memorial Park (the paths in War Memorial Park are to be upgraded to real cycleway widths very soon)
- one route linking Keith Hay Park southwards to Hillsborough Road (with a bridge over SH20 and cycle paths in Keith Hay Park already there, this new route will link up nicely north-south – and will also connect to the residential street cycle routes to be built as part of the Dominion Road upgrade)
Not all the new paths in the future Greenways network in Puketatapa will be cycleable (those paths along the sometimes steep Manukau Harbour coastline will probably mostly be for walkers only) and not all paths will be able to be off-road. But the idea of a network of high-quality cycle and walking links – useful for both recreation and cycle commuting – is one that dovetails perfectly with CAA’s goals to get a bigger part of our population cycling every day.
We were thus delighted that Richard even used a few CAA slides from one of our earlier presentations (one slide that highlighted the Regional Cycle Network, and one about how cycling extends the range of public transport). The work by Boards like Puketapapa is invaluable to communicate Auckland’s strong wish for better walking and cycling to other decisionmakers.
