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By admin, January 26, 2013

Another bridge is about to be opened for traffic late February – NZTA have almost finished constructing the new Richardson Road bridge between New Windsor / Owairaka. The bridge leads over the future Waterview Motorway.

And it will have wide (3.5m) shared paths on each side, with the western side also having a direct off-road link down to the Waterview Cycleway going west and east. Cycle Action originally saw the plans for the bridge proposing cycle lanes, and narrow(er) footpaths. We felt that that close to one of our premier cycleways, Auckland could do better! So we instead suggested that the footpaths be widened out and changed to shared paths instead (note to those who prefer to ride on-road – the flush median will help ensure you aren’t crowded out).

We are very happy that our suggestions were taken up – we suspect that the photo also shown at the bottom right (of a shared bridge path in Europe) may have played a role in that. We had shown it around the project team and the local decisionmakers when we suggested the shared path change, showing how things can work

As a result, the “tendrils” branching off this off-road cycling network “trunk” will now reach another couple hundred meters further into the surrounding areas, encouraging people to take up urban cycling.

Well done, NZTA and Council / AT.

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By Max, May 5, 2012

Having recently read on this blog about the Greenways network in Puketapapa, you will be keen to hear (if you hadn’t known long since!) that these projects are far from paper exercises. They aren’t something that might or might not happen in a few years (the story of too many good cycling projects).

No, this part of the southern central isthmus already has a good variety of walking and cycling paths (click through twice to the images on the right – showing some paths along the upper reaches of Oakley Creek – if you like to see some of what they have already done).

Now the next step is linking these paths together by closing the gaps, and encourage people to use them for cycling for transport, as well as for short leisure rides!

And linking up is what the works planned next for Puketapapa are all about. Two key projects are about to start:

Continue reading 'Greenways bridges and paths growing in Puketapapa'»