KEY POINTS:
After the jack-hammers, construction barriers, dust and controversy in Queen St over the past two years, Aucklanders probably expected something stunning. The $43.5 million reconstruction of Queen St, now complete, has made alterations more subtle than stunning. Many strollers will share the impression of a shop owner quoted
in our series this week: "It looks pretty similar".
But the result deserves a closer look. The footpaths have been widened in places, the plane trees replaced with nikau, new seating installed in timber and stone with designwork. Places of heritage interest are identified with inscriptions in the new bluestone paving. More generous pedestrian crossings have been provided. It may be enough to make the street more inviting to people and less so to traffic.
As always, advocates of turning the street into a pedestrian mall are disappointed. They cite successful city centres overseas that are thriving without traffic. But they are not main cities. The big metropolitan centres of the world retain the busy element of passing traffic.
Even in Auckland, the centre that has stolen some of Queen St's lustre, Newmarket, has not converted Broadway to a mall. Widened footpaths and crossings in the right places are sufficient to let pedestrians and motorists know that people, not cars, have priority.
The campaign to save the stately liquidambars and plane trees in Queen St did not succeed in keeping more than 60 of 143. The nikau that have replaced them are now standing, each in its own irrigated cell of soil. They attempt to change the character of the street to something more Pacific. Let us hope they flourish.
The reconstruction will have passed its main test, though, if more prestigious retail brands move in. Junk shops and tourist traps have proliferated in the street for too long. The news that AMP is already refurbishing its buildings to house an expanded Louis Vuitton outlet and opening this week of a Gucci store in Queen St are definite signs of hope.
Prada, Tiffany, Gap and Apple are said to be close behind them.
Next, the city needs more of the Golden Mile's landlords of its older buildings to spruce them up - or make them available for redevelopment. Too many tatty old eyesores survive in downtown Auckland, particularly in lower Queen St and the streets to its east.
Much of that precinct was owned by the city council for a major transport terminal but now that the Britomart station is built, much of the surrounding blight remains.
A city should not need a big occasion to inspire a general face-lift but it helps; the 2011 rugby World Cup's climactic events will put an international spotlight on Auckland and attract tens of thousands of visitors. It is just three years away, time enough to smarten up.
Auckland enjoys a physical setting that demands a better standard of building and urban planning than it has had. The Viaduct Harbour, built for the defences of the America's Cup, has illustrated what is possible. The same standard is being maintained in waterfront developments westward so far.
It is high time improvements started to happen to the east, on Customs St and Quay St.
The three old wharves at the bottom of Queen St should be cleared of bananas and cars and turned into terminals for ferries and cruise ships.
The Britomart buildings that claim some heritage value should live up to the claim or be demolished.
The council has made a start with Queen St. New retail tenants attracted to there need no less a commitment from the property owners. And existing tenants, whose businesses have suffered two years of upheaval, deserve to capitalise on the council's effort.
