Uneasy street

Locals reckon Glen Eden is a difficult place to negotiate on foot. Joanna Davies takes a walk around.

Glanmall Place is a street with car parking down the middle. There are a couple of pedestrian crossings, but none with zebra stripes.
On either side of the street there are rows of shops. To get to some of these shops, locals climb stairs from the road, but if you have a pram or a Zimmer frame, you're walking in front of cars to reach a suitable entrance.
And as the cars drive through, hardly slowing for the intersections at each end of the street, shopkeeper Ian Burkett worries about how dangerous the road is getting.
"A few years ago an elderly lady had an accident when she was trying to cross the road here.
"We're not sure if she was actually hit by the car, but she did fall and she passed away because of her injuries."
Since then the Glen Eden Business Association, which Mr Burkett chairs, has been working towards making the shopping centre safer for pedestrians.
The Glen Eden library, on the corner of Glendale Rd and Glenmall Place, has become a meeting spot for locals, but with no crossing to the other side of Glenmall Place, pedestrians have to hot-foot across a busy intersection.
"We are hoping to get a raised crossing here because there is nothing telling the drivers to slow down through here," says Mr Burkett.
"It's a fault with the original design of the street, it was built for cars. But more and more people are using public transport and walking to the shops, and the street hasn't changed to accommodate that."
Another crossing is proposed for the other end of Glenmall Place - but that's not the end of Glen Eden's street issues.
On West Coast Rd, it's difficult for pedestrians to get to the train station.
"There is parking in front of the ramp that people with pushchairs or wheelchairs use," says Mr Burkett. "Crossing the road to get there is hard, too, because it's on the corner of another busy intersection."
The former Waitakere City Council budgeted $127,000 to upgrade the train station car park and a further $600,000 to improve Glenmall Place.
This budget has been carried over to the new council, and Auckland Transport will oversee both projects.
Auckland Transport spokes-woman Sharon Hunter says speed tables and new footpaths will be built around the station.
"Importantly, a continuous footpath will be provided from the train station to the bus stop and on to the pedestrian crossing on West Coast Rd, making the site much safer for pedestrians to navigate," says Ms Hunter.
"The station car park will also include drop-off car parking, as well as wheelchair and pram access."
Ms Hunter says access to the car park from the Glenview Rd side will be closed permanently to make it safer for pedestrians.
Over at Glenmall, three speed tables will be built to slow cars down, and they will double as crossings.
"The projects are expected to start in early 2011. However, no definitive start dates have been set yet."
Next steps
For more info on the project, call Auckland Transport on 355 3553.