Waka Kotahi Transport Agency just released the National Land Transport Programme for 2021-24. This lays out what they'll be spending money on over the next 3 years. Greater Auckland did a brief summary here. This blog highlights a few observations that stood out to me. Waka Kotahi is still coming to grips with the transition … Continue reading National Land Transport Programme →

Ecan recently commissioned a study into making buses free in Christchurch. Metro Fares Analysis - FinalDownload As a reminder, this is the current fare levels. Christchurch fares are relatively low by national standards - certainly much cheaper than both Auckland and Wellington. A couple of interesting points about fares in Christchurch: 12% of total patronage … Continue reading Free Bus Fares →

Just a brief note to say that another medical article has been published showing that riding a bike improves your health. jamainternal_riedlarsen_2021_oi_210036_1625699526.32027Download It is well-established now that riding a bike every day decreases your chances of premature mortality. This study takes it further and shows that this is even more so if you have diabetes. … Continue reading Riding a Bike is Good for you if you have Diabetes →

This is a guest post from reader Tim Frank I regularly use a shared path, often with my children. I constantly have to look over my shoulder to see whether a fast bike is coming. From a pedestrian or slow cyclist view, some of the bikes come up very quickly indeed. When we return home … Continue reading Bells and bikes →

I've whinged about hospital bike parking before (here and here), but they seem to keep on making the same mistakes so I'll try again. I had to visit the emergency department last week. It's in the recently completed Waipapa building, a state-of-the-art facility that opened late last year, cost $525m, and is the biggest hospital … Continue reading Christchurch Hospital Bike Parking →

Housing density determines transport provision. I think this needs to be talked about more in Christchurch. This article uses Census data to confirm that this is the case in Canterbury, then uses pictures to discuss how this plays out for different types of housing we have in Christchurch. The 2018 Census asked people what type … Continue reading Christchurch Housing Density →

Christchurch's public transport is often talked about in a negative light. It attracts a low mode share for a city of Christchurch's size, and recently this mode share has been shrinking rather than growing. This constant negativity is justified, but I do wonder if it has made people underappreciate how many people Christchurch's public transport … Continue reading Putting Bus Ridership Numbers into Perspective →

Canberra is a city with a lot of similarities to Christchurch. They both contain roughly half a million people, they both have low density of development with few geographic constraints. Consequently they both have high car mode share. They both experience some congestion, although it's not as acute as other cities. As a result they … Continue reading Canberra Light Rail →

Prompted by Brendon Harre, I had a look at the population of each region in New Zealand compared to the amount of vehicle travel it has each year ("vehicle-kilometres travelled" or VKT). I took the populations from Statistics NZ, both the 2018 counts and the 2048 future projected population. I then took the vehicle-kilometres travelled … Continue reading Population versus Vehicle Travel →

There is a really important piece of work going on at the moment that will decide Christchurch's future for the next 30 odd years. I haven't heard a whole lot of talk about it, so I thought I'd draw people's attention to it here. The Greater Christchurch Partnership is a group comprising these eight organisations: … Continue reading Greater Christchurch 2050 →