John Williamson: Covid 19 experience fuels cycling on footpaths rethink

Allowing anyone to ride an e-bike, bike, e-scooter or motorised skateboard on the footpath was among the proposals in the Accessible Streets package. Photo / NZME

ON THE ROAD

We've emerged from the pandemic crisis but are we back to normal? Much of the lockdown commentary was about taking the opportunity to change and create a "new normal" and we wonder what that means. More online business, more working from home. A slower pace of life, more walking and cycling and getting to know your neighbourhood and country.

It all sounds very esoteric, but many business sectors and the people in them are under real pressure, with survival in a new normal being a matter of innovation, resilience and knuckling down.

The lockdown experience of walking and cycling was preceded in early March by the government release for consultation of its Accessible Streets package. Submissions on this closed on May 20.

The package proposed a raft of possible changes to micro mobility including allowing anyone to ride an e-bike, bike, e-scooter or motorised skateboard on the footpath. They would need to be used courteously and considerately and without endangering others, be less than 75mm wide and keep below 15km/h. Riders would have to give way to pedestrians and wheelchairs.

Other changes impose a minimum gap when vehicles overtake cyclists on the road and requires powered transport devices be fitted with front and rear lights and a reflector. Cyclists would be allowed to pass slow moving vehicles on the left - allowing them to the front of queues at intersections. They would be allowed to ride straight ahead out of a left turning lane.

The Hātea Loop shared pathway has transformed Whangārei's micro mobility transport experience. Photo / File

Many of the proposed changes are about bringing the law into line with how people actually use the road and ensuring the road rules reflect real life. It's about making streets safer and less congested particularly for getting younger children to school. Policing these rules will be another matter but common-sense will play a big part.

All this is very pragmatic stuff in seeing the footpath as a safe place for vulnerable travellers to get out of the way of faster heavier traffic while moving from A to B.

Covid-19 though, has put a different perspective on the purpose of roads and footpaths. When the pace of life is slower and people needed to exercise, the thoroughfare became more of a social space when residents reclaimed their road or street as a place where it was okay to wander and play. A road without a footpath is missing something.

Footpaths can be seen as a foundation of our public spaces used by all members of the community. They can be viewed as places for meeting, stopping, talking, playing, living and learning and not just for getting from A to B.

Just consider how the Hatea Loop shared pathway has transformed Whangārei's riverside. This presumes that footpaths are wide enough and separate enough to promote a more leisurely pace of life and that casual walking can co-exist with the 70cm wide e-bike, the unpredictable e-scooter rider and the wobbly learner biker.

It is somewhat inspirational then, that the Innovating Streets for People pilot fund was launched during the lockdown. This is a project based fund to help councils create more people friendly spaces in their towns and cities.

The fund comes under the banner of "Tactical Urbanism". This encourages councils to experiment with pilot projects, pop-ups and interim street treatments to make it safer and/or easier for people to move around or access community spaces, by trialling an activity which could lead to permanent change.

The incentive is a 90 per cent Financial Assistance Rate and projects need to be submitted by July 3.

New Zealand's Covid-19 response though was not an experiment. We have experienced a different way of doing things which will be unique in our lifetime. They say never waste a crisis. We can choose to take the learnings from these crisis experiences into our new normal.

• John Williamson is chairman of Roadsafe Northland and Northland Road Safety Trust, a former national councillor for NZ Automobile Association and former Whangārei District Council member.