Roger Apperley: Lack of an alternative keeps Aucklanders in their cars

COMMENT


As a partner in a 102-year-old professional business in Queen St for more than a third of that time and a central-city resident for four years, I am excited by the Auckland City Council's plan for a $23 million redevelopment.

I have observed the suburbanisation of Auckland to Los Angeles-type proportions, to an extent that only 11 per cent of the region's workforce now works in the city centre. This is low by international standards.

It has, therefore, been pleasing to see the return of people to live and work in the city. This is essential if Auckland is to become a true world centre.

After all, cities are for people, and we need them to feel safer, enjoy a sense of community, and better experience the vibrancy a city offers.

I also hear stories of how dowdy Queen St is today. We are certainly not achieving its potential. But, increasingly, people are returning to the strip shopping centres, where they can enjoy entertainment, culture and some top retailing.

In line with this trend, Aucklanders are embracing the higher-density, apartment-type lifestyle. Today, 8900 Aucklanders call the city centre home, up from 1000 only five years ago.

This trend is predicted to more than treble over the next decade.

These are, indeed, exciting times for those who choose to locate their businesses and live in the heart of our city - and even more exciting when we see the plans the city council has.

Extended footpaths and a boulevard of pasifika-type trees will immediately tell people they are in a modern Pacific city.

Equally welcome will be spaces that recognise the importance of pedestrians over cars, with parks linking into Queen St and seating that enhances the community feel of a modern retailing environment.

The present situation with a four-lane expressway next to the highest pedestrian count in the country fails any logical test. We have to do better, and the council's plan is a huge step in this direction with one exception - the absence of parking.

This is an emotive issue. I believe that we only think we love our cars. The reality is that we enjoy their convenience because we do not have a viable alternative.

If we had a choice, we could decide whether we travelled by car, and paid the true cost by way of parking charges, or used public transport.

The debate over parking charges arises because we are hostage to the lack of an alternative.

So, any plan for any upgrade for Auckland's centre must contain a public transport component to replace the 45 Queen St carparks that will be lost. There should be an extension of the existing free city-circuit service, arriving every five minutes.

It could be low level and it would probably have limited seating because most of the passengers would be short-trip, standing-only commuters.

We would be moving people, not cars. Visitors would park in periphery carparks confident that buses would carry them about the city centre for the rest of their stay.

Public transport must, of course, be reliable, attractive, comfortable, fast and environmentally friendly. This means priority must be given to it over cars.

There also needs to be integration with all forms of public transport from the suburbs (trains, buses and ferries). Britomart provides us with an important first step.

To achieve the goal of reducing urban sprawl and becoming a world-class city, we need to remember all attractive and people-friendly cities have hearts. This must be a commercial heart, a retailing heart, an entertainment heart, a cultural heart and a spiritual heart. We can and must do better in all these aspects.

We need to be working on public transport now so that the need to park outside the store or business we want to visit will no longer be a priority.

My concern is that at a recent city council consultation meeting on the project, no plan for improved public transport seemed to be part of the brief.

We have time to get this right, and we must. If we fail in this important revitalisation of Auckland, we condemn it to remain a series of disjointed and dysfunctional villages.

* Roger Apperley is a Queen St optometrist.