Brent Barrett's Home Planet: Better bike lanes improve safety for all

Palmy has many great places to move by foot or pedal including He Ara Kotahi Bridge. Photo / ManawatuNZ.co.nz

OPINION:

True confession, I'm a geek at heart. And one of my favourite ways to geek out is on local transport and mobility.

In the 20 years since moving to Palmy, I've seen plenty of changes on our streets. Perhaps you have to. Once a big town without traffic, today we're a small city. And yes, local traffic is now a thing to factor into travel times. Liberation from traffic snarls and the cost of driving, plus the massive health benefits of getting active, is leading more people of all ages to have a go at walking, bikes or buses - at least for some of their local journeys.

You need look no further than a local bike shop. If international numbers are anything to go by, our latest bike boom is just beginning. Famous for cutting the headwind and flattening hills, electric bikes are a great way to zoom about our fine city.

But you don't have to go electric on a bike. A cheap and cheerful pedal bike will do the trick. Lucky for us all, Palmy has many great places to move by foot or pedal. When I first moved here, the riverside had just a narrow muddy track. Now we've the much-loved He Ara Kotahi Bridge and several kilometres of all-weather shared path to enjoy by foot or by bike.

More recently, the College St upgrade offers another cross-city connection with safer space for people on bikes. Feeding these main bike routes are bits of bike lane on urban streets. They're a great start, but we've a long way to go before we enjoy connected up safer spaces for everyone on our roads.

Among those still reading at this point, I can hear the rustling as some rise to lament better bike lanes and the people who will travel in them. If it's any help, there's good evidence that better bike lanes improve safety for everyone, including people in cars. And we know biking helps people stay healthy, which saves on healthcare costs.

A fair-weather bike rider, I've more recently dabbled with commuting by bus. And I've been pleasantly surprised to learn how many people go by bus in our city, with more than a million rides in a typical year. I've also been surprised to discover that unlike many communities across New Zealand, there's no local grassroots voice for bus riders on the city network.

Now you may well ask, why bother finding and listening to voices for bus users? I asked a friend about this, and they reckoned that even if you don't ride a bus and never will, you're still better off filling the advocacy gap to help promote better bus services and increased ridership. Simply put, a person on the bus is one less person hunting for the same parking spot, pouring hard-earned cash into extra cars clogging up our streets, and deepening the climate crisis by burning more petrol.

So just like the bike lanes that improve mobility and help make our city streets safer for everyone, filling more bus seats would make Palmy a better city for us all. If reading this has started the wheels turning inside your head, you're welcome to get in touch for a yarn. A quick Google will turn up my contact details. But you have been warned, I'm a local transport geek at heart.

Eco-tip. It's autumn, a great time to turn the soil and plan your garden for the year ahead.

• Brent Barrett is an environmental advocate, city councillor and scientist. The views expressed here are his own.