15 December 2015

Cyclists are seeing the light and heading to Nelson St

The magenta walking and cycling path over Auckland’s Spaghetti Junction is proving popular with thousands of people trying it out in the first couple of weeks. On the opening day almost 2800 people cycled on Lightpath, Te Ara I Whiti with hundreds more on foot enjoying the sweeping views across the city and harbour.

While it has been an encouraging start, it will take time to know how many people will use it regularly says Kathryn King, Auckland Transport’s Walking and Cycling Manager.

“All cycleways reach their potential when they connect with other paths. With a number of cycle projects in the inner city to be completed in the next two to three years, we predict a real growth in the number of people choosing to bike into the city.”

Assuming the inner city network is completed, Auckland Transport projects 1400 cycle movements per day on Nelson St by 2026.

“Our research indicates that people want to feel safe when cycling which is why we will be building a building a cycle network with a focus on cycleways physically separated from traffic like Nelson St.

“One of the objectives is to create some buzz about the cycle infrastructure we’re building and Lightpath has certainly grabbed people’s attention.

“In raising awareness of existing cycle infrastructure, we’re hoping more people will consider cycling to into the city for work or study,” she says.

The NZ Transport Agency’s Auckland Director, Ernst Zollner says ‘missing link’ projects such as this one are critical to achieving the Government’s goal of getting more people using bikes in urban areas, with the aim of increasing the number of cycle trips by 30 per cent by 2019.

“To do that we need to create user-friendly cycling corridors to get people where they want to go safely and quickly. We’re delighted with the numbers of people already using the cycleway and we expect those numbers to increase as people learn how it gives them safe travel choices.”

ENDS

© Scoop Media