Melbourne CBD Flourished after kicking the addiction
Melbourne could show Auckland the way in kicking its debilitating car addiction inside the CBD (and in time our Metropolitan and Town Centres).
From The Age:
Arteries unclogged, new blood: CBD alive!
- Date
- December 7, 2013
The bleak, sparse, functional commercial centre of Melbourne 20 years ago, with its car-laden, congested streets in business hours and empty after five, is gone.
The city once described as a doughnut, because it was hollow in the middle, has transformed into a metropolis unambiguously focused to the centre for jobs, housing and entertainment.
New figures from Melbourne City Council demonstrate the transformation and predict the continued popularity of the laneways lifestyle.
The new data shows the city’s residential population almost doubling in a decade, with the towers and townhouses of inner Melbourne now accommodating more than 100,000 residents – making the central city one of the fastest growing residential areas in the state.
The council analysis predicts the central city population will almost double again in less than 20 years.
It was a different story in 1993 when the National Australia Bank reportedly refused to finance residential developments in the city centre because it did not think it would work.
Macquarie Bank took a punt with number one Exhibition Street on the corner of Flinders Street and it proved the tipping point.
”It sold off the plan in three months and changed the whole psychology,” said Professor Rob Adams, Melbourne City Council’s director of city design.
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He said the inner city residential population was a blend of baby boomers, students and young professionals.
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You can read the full article over at The Age (link is above)
What Melbourne shows us that from 1993 Melbourne decided to take a punt and it paid off in spades. Melbourne CBD is known for its: shopping, hospitality, living and entertainment. Something Auckland CBD is trying but is still seriously lacking owing to be honest pro-car NIMBY’s getting in the road (I can think of one particular Councillor in particular especially around one of our Waterfront streets).
The good news for Auckland is that transformational changes for the core CBD is under way with streets being turned into shared spaces (Fort Street being the most recent although it is waiting on stage 3 to start to finish it all off). O’Connell Street is the next street to be turned into a shared space with construction starting in March next year.
The next two big streets to be flipped over to get the CBD more friendly towards people is both High Street and Queen Street itself. Although and understandably with Queen Street it is going to have to be done stages over a six-year time frame starting with the stretch outside Aotea Square (as Ludo Campbell-Reid suggested while I was at the Fort Street tour recently).
Once the City Rail Link is complete I can see no good reason why cars need to treat mid and lower Queen Street as a rat running thoroughfare to get to other places around the CBD. These cars not only lower the amenity of Queen Street but are not really bringing in economic value into the area. Queen Street shoppers have either caught public transport in or in a parking building that on the main thoroughfares like Mayoral Drive, Customs Street and Victoria Street. Also with parking extremely limited on Queen Street as is can some one give me a reason why cars need to treat mid and lower Queen Street as a thoroughfare rather than shared spaces and/or pedestrian malls?
If Melbourne can kick the car addiction and make itself a destination to be then Auckland can do the same as well.
As with our Metropolitan and Town Centres some magic can be worked to make them more hospitable and attractive to the people again. Taking parking out of the main street (as well as thoroughfare traffic) and flipping it over to shared spaces will attract more people to the Town Centre rather than throwing more parking down it (something Papakura needs to learn if it does not want to die).
Metropolitan Centres like Manukau can turn their wide roads into boulevards that still allow the car, but also raise the amenity of the area and encourage active transport within the area (Ronwood Avenue is a good place to start after Davis Avenue upgrade is complete).
On a final note of sense of place I just caught this piece again on Melbourne:
Home-town homage
- Date: December 8, 2013
Alana Schetzer
Melbourne is celebrating itself with wit and style.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/hometown-homage-20131207-2yxp9.html#ixzz2mpNALREM
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Talking Southern Auckland 