Media Release

Major roading upgrade in Albany begins

20 June, 2008

North Shore City Council has begun upgrading Civic Crescent, which runs alongside the front of Westfield Mall in Albany. It’s one of a number of large projects underway to improve transport in the city.

The upgrade will take one year. It will introduce a bus service to the street for the first time but there will also be a strong urban design element to beautify the road environment and make it more attractive and safer for pedestrians. There will be traffic-calming measures to slow down vehicles, and a speed limit of 30kph.

Project engineer Ian Bielawa says the council’s aim is to make the whole area attractive and people-friendly, with lots of open space and greenery. “We want to make it a pleasant place to spend time in, whether or not you’re catching a bus or travelling through in a vehicle.”

A bus station and shelters are being built so that shoppers can catch public transport conveniently to and from the mall. There will be facilities for cyclists, a safer layout for pedestrians, new seating and lighting, and trees are being planted on both sides of the road to create a leafy avenue from end to end.

The work is being carried out at the same time as the council is planting and landscaping around the Albany Lakes on the other side of the street from the mall.

Once the project is finished next year, people on foot will be able to move smoothly from the steps of the mall, across a raised road surface that slows down traffic, and into the park-like lakes area which will be one of the major green spaces in Albany.

The construction cost is $4.2 million.

To see what Civic Crescent will look like in the future, click here:

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For more information about transport improvements in the city, visit www.northshorecity.govt.nz.

ENDS

Attached: CivicCrescentUpgradeSign.pdf

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