Embracing Change: MRCagney's July Newsletter
Kia ora! Welcome back to the MRCagney Newsletter, July Edition.
This guest editorial comes to you from Kent Lundberg, who was recently interviewed by RNZ about the ‘pedestrianisation’ of city centres .
In the past, reallocating road space generally meant?adding buses or cycleways to streets. Today the trend to is to reduce traffic to free up space. While we are finally making progress in Aotearoa, we are well behind cities overseas.
Since the 1980s, France has been using the introduction of modern trams as the opportunity to re-configure cities that had been dominated and disconfigured by cars. This included removing traffic severance, redistributing traffic, and rebuilding streetscapes from fa?ade to fa?ade.
?Also in the 1980s, Italy introduced new rules to manage traffic in city centres called Zone a Traffico Limitato (ZTL), or traffic-limited zones. The national-level rules allow local governments to restrict vehicle traffic to certain vehicles, trip types and times of day. These restrictions were intended to reduce ‘through traffic’ over a wide area to reduce the impact of cars in the historic cores.
In the Netherlands, the Dutch have a similar concept called ‘autoluw’, where traffic is limited to people who have a local destination but prevents through traffic. The Dutch are also most famous for comprehensive traffic circulation plans which greatly reduce traffic from the central core while freeing up large areas of space for better public transport, and streets with different degrees of car-freeness.
It is not true that most European cities have always been quaint and attractive people places. These cities were becoming car-dominated by the 1980s, and purposefully chose to change directions. One of the most interesting case studies is Belgium where cities have been desperately trying to catch up to their neighbours. In 2017, Ghent introduced a Dutch style traffic circulation plan as a way to catch up to places like Utrecht. The plan only cost 5 million euros, but dramatically improved sustainable transport use, improved livability,?and access.
The ongoing steps to remove traffic from Queen Street and the Golden Mile will make a big impact to the quality of city life, but they are only incremental compared to widescale, purposeful initiatives happening in many cities overseas. - Kent Lundberg .
MRCagney People & Projects
Diversity Agenda
Jenson Varghese attended the Diversity Agenda Annual Summit . MRCagney are proud signatories of the Diversity Agenda Accord. Jenson is also a part of the Diversity Agenda Steering committee.
Jesse Promoted to Senior Consultant
We are delighted to announce that Jesse Prendergast has been promoted to Senior Consultant! Over the past few years, he has led, managed, and contributed to projects that create better outcomes for people through data science, economics, and planning. Since 2021, Jesse has been a leader in the transport emissions space, delivering high-profile projects such as Transport 2035, helping Aotearoa plan for a sustainable future. Alongside delivering excellent work, he has offered guidance to team members, helped improve business processes, and fostered an engaged and social company culture. Thanks for your continued efforts, Jesse - congratulations!
Parking for Politicians
In mid-July, Scott Ebbett and Steven Burgess (Complete Streets, Australia ) travelled across Aotearoa for a series of workshops with mayors and councillors to discuss parking and ways to utilise street space for better outcomes. The workshops were to support the Waka Kotahi Streets for People and Transport Choices programme , and were held in Gisborne, Taupo, Napier, Masterton and Nelson/Tasman.
The workshops helped councillors understand how better parking management can help with reallocation of street space to different uses and approaches for communicating changes involving parking to?the public. Steven Burgess is a transport engineer and urban strategist, and Scott Ebbett is a nationally recognised expert in integrated public parking management with experience in public and private practice. The feedback from these workshops was very positive and there are?already requests for more towns to be included.
Parking Lessons for Canberra
It’s been a big month for parking at MRCagney. Scott and Transport Planner Malcolm McCracken hosted a webinar for Greater Canberra about the impact that removal of parking minima has had in New Zealand. In 2020, New Zealand became the first country in the world to remove minimum parking requirements from planning rules nationally. In the webinar, Malcolm and Scott discuss how these planning reforms were introduced, the changes that are being seen across New Zealand, and what Canberra needs to do to achieve more affordable and sustainable housing. You can watch it online below.
Dispatch from the Second Annual Urban Economics Course
To kick off July, Principal Economist Shane Martin – along with Stuart Donovan from VLC in Brisbane – hosted their 2nd annual 3-day Urban Economics short-course in Auckland. The course was attended by more than 40 people with a broad cross-section of experience including university students, officers from local and central government, consultancies, and elected officials. Topics both theoretical and practical were discussed, from the monocentric city model – which is a simple, yet intuitive model of why cities form – to discussions on the pros and cons of different measures of affordability and how various government policies have impacted the housing market.
Levelling the Playing Field for Regional PT
Following his presentation at the Future is Rail Conference last month, Technical Director Darren Davis published a blog on his substack explaining how Aotearoa's watersheds have come to influence the success (and challenges) of interregional public transport. Read the blog here to find out why "being on the wrong side of the water flow should not be a determinant of access to public transport."
领英推荐
?Darren also wrote a piece for Infrastructure News about the sudden cancellation of Te Huia Services into Auckland earlier this month. If you were scratching your head about the decision, Darren's article is a great explanation as to why it happened - and whether it was justified or not.
Insights from Aotearoa, and around the world
Great Streets Around the Motu
On his tour around the country, Scott Ebbett was impressed with some of the great street projects happening in some towns. Taupō?has reconnected the town centre to the beautiful lakefront by diverting the main arterial road and creating an amazing public space in its place. Napier has reclaimed a section of Market Street from cars and opened the street to outdoor dining, seating and plantings. There is also some cool activation of laneways in Napier. Masterton has replaced on-street parking with a large covered outdoor dining area to add vibrancy to the street.
Reviving Rail in the USA
What would an Amtrak revival look like? The $75 billion plan to dramatically expand passenger rail service could transform US train travel – if the state agrees to get on board. Amtrak service between Seattle and Portland, like much of the US passenger rail system, is underwhelming. Just four trips per day are made between the two cities. Soon, however, under the national rail carrier’s proposed expansion plan, the service would more than triple to 13 trips a day. Click here to read on.
Bike Lanes Really are Good for Business
“Before 2020, we were talking about one shared street. Now we have six.” From Manhattan to San Francisco, the need to rethink the urban core is encouraging business improvement districts to change their tune on prioritising?cars. Read more about how businesses in NYC and SF are learning to love bike lanes.
Big Ideas to Make Big Cities More Child Friendly
17 big ideas to make Philadelphia a more kid-friendly city, which every big city should take note of!
Tasmania Puts $1.2M into E-Bikes
By replacing many of the trips people would otherwise take by car, e-bikes have massive capacity to tackle transport-related carbon emissions, and governments around the world have started to recognise their potential. In June, the Tasmanian Government joined them by committing to $1.2 million in incentives for people buying e-bikes, e-scooters and e-vehicles – and the rest of AUS should follow suit. Read more here. ?
Upcoming Events
Urban Nerds with Lucy Saunders
We enjoy heading along to Auckland's Urban Nerd catchups (there are similar events in Wellington too, if you're based in the Capital). The next event's special guest will be Lucy Saunders , creator of the fantastic Healthy Streets tool. Come along on Monday 7th August, 5PM at Good George on North Wharf to say hi to Lucy and catch up with Auckland's keenest urbanists!
And that's a wrap...
We hope you've enjoyed the July edition of The MRCagney Newsletter!
If you have any questions, or want to discuss something further, please reach out via LinkedIn! Or you can get in touch with our team on?[email protected]