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Innovating Streets projects agreed by Auckland Council

Posted: 13 May 2020 |

Auckland Council’s Emergency Committee has endorsed Auckland Transport’s applications to the Innovating Streets for People pilot fund, which looks to develop innovative solutions to make Auckland safer and more sustainable.

Innovating Streets projects agreed by Auckland Council

Auckland Council’s Emergency Committee has endorsed Auckland Transport (AT) to take part in Innovating Streets for People pilot fund.

The projects, from across the region, range from safe street improvements outside schools, slow street interventions, and walking and cycling facilities. The Innovating Streets fund is designed to allow for quick lower cost projects to be trialled as a transition for long term projects.

One project, in Waiuku, aims to improve safety at an intersection by trialling a rubber roundabout.

Auckland Mayor Phil Goff said that Innovating Streets is about creating safer, more people-friendly streets. “Government funding allows us to work with local communities and their local boards to design and test changes at low cost to see how well they can achieve the objective of creating places that are good for pedestrians and people on bikes to be.

“The projects we are submitting in the first application round focus on making streets around schools safer for students and improving town and city centres to be more pleasant places for those who visit them.

“When an idea we test works well and has strong community support, we can look to make the changes permanent,” Goff said.

Councillor Chris Darby added: “With generous and creative government funding, we can fast-forward plans to enliven streets for people by providing room to move safely and enjoyably.

“The lockdown has seen Aucklanders rediscover the delight of walking and cycling and now’s the time to lock in some of the good habits we took up during the lockdown.

“Innovating Streets is just the tonic, providing playful interventions like play-street programmes, ‘Slow Sundays’, low traffic zones, pop-up bike paths and car calming around schools.”

“Through the COVID-19 Alert Level 4 lockdown, people have already enjoyed what it is like to have quiet roads and streets, with more space for people to walk, cycle and experience public spaces in a different way,” said Adrienne Young-Cooper, who chairs AT.

“People have not only seen what the future might look like, but they have actually lived it and loved it. We want to take the great lessons from the past few weeks and deliver more of what our communities want.

“The projects we are including in our application will deliver medium term, tactical improvement trials that we can learn from and work closely with locals to co-design. It’s also a great opportunity for Panuku, Auckland Transport and Auckland Council to continue to collaborate on projects to make communities more accessible to all.”