Locals are up in arms about East Coast road's five pedestrian crossings being installed within 900m.
Video / Sylvie Whinray
Moves by Auckland Transport (AT) to install a pedestrian crossing every few hundred metres on a stretch of North Shore road has been branded “overkill” by a resident.
AT is currently installing three new pedestrian crossings on East Coast Rd in Forrest Hill, just past an existing pedestrian crossing nearthe top of Forrest Hill Rd where it joins East Coast Rd. The distance between the four crossings is about 900m.
Forest Hill local Andrew Stevenson. Photo / Sylvie Whinray
Resident Andrew Stevenson said he was a strong advocate for road safety and wouldn’t want his children to cross East Coast Rd without some sort of crossing, but he is dumbfounded by the number of new signalised pedestrian crossings.
“Who are these crossings for?” asked Stevenson, saying the stretch of East Coast Rd was mostly residential with few pedestrians and only the odd pocket of shops.
He said AT ran a 12-hour survey about 150m back from the pedestrian crossing at the top of Forrest Hill Rd that showed 43 pedestrians used an existing refuge island and described the demand as “low”. It also found one fatal accident and two minor injuries in five years.
“This gives some idea as to the low pedestrian volumes and low number of crashes in the area.
“Is it really necessary to put in a crossing for 43 people? That’s less than two people an hour crossing the road.”
It seemed like “overkill” and unnecessarily expensive when a painted zebra crossing might have been sufficient, he said.
The Herald has put a series of questions to AT over the past two days about the crossings and has not received a response.
The existing pedestrian crossing at the top of Forrest Hill Rd. Photo / Sylvie Whinray
The crossings are part of improvements along East Coast Rd to “reduce reliance on cars” and include a new bus lane and improved bus shelters and stops.
Automobile Association Auckland spokesman Martin Glynn said pedestrians needed safe crossings in the right places.
Decisions about whether a crossing was needed should take into account the number of people expected to use it and the number of motorists and bus passengers using the road.
On major arterial roads, minimising the impact on traffic flow was particularly important when considering whether to install pedestrian crossings, he said.
The prevalence and cost of new pedestrian crossings have caught the attention of senior politicians, including Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown and National’s transport spokesman Simeon Brown, who could shortly become transport minister in the new National-led government.
Wayne Brown, writing in the Herald last month, said AT recently announced it had installed 300 raised pedestrian crossings for $89 million, amounting to $300,000 each – “a ludicrous expense at a time we don’t seem to have the money to fill potholes”.
“You can build a house for this. It has to stop,” he said.
In May, the Herald reported AT spent $346,000 on a raised light-controlled pedestrian crossing on Williamson Ave in Grey Lynn. Faulty work was picked up during construction but it took seven months before the problems were fixed, causing more disruption.
Brown said the “stuff-up” was simply not good enough.
National transport spokesman Simeon Brown could be about to become the next minister of transport. Photo / Alex Cairns
Last year, Brown stopped plans by AT to install a $450,000 raised pedestrian crossing in his Pakuranga electorate on Pakuranga Rd.
He labelled it “crazy” and went on to rally against AT’s programme of speed limits, saying a National government would repeal a speed limit rule that AT is using to lower speeds on a quarter of the city’s arterial and local roads.
He said National supported variable speed limits outside schools during drop-off and pick-up times but opposed blanket speed reductions, which simply slowed people down at all hours of day and night.
Bernard Orsman is an Auckland-based reporter who has been covering local government and transport since 1998. He joined the Herald in 1990 and worked in the parliamentary press gallery for six years.
