SH16 Bus Lanes End At Waterview

 

ARC officers were asked today why proposed bus lanes on the northwestern Sh16 motorway would end at Waterview and not continue into the city.

Officers are working on ways bus improvements could be incorporated into NZTA’s current motorway widening projects, especially SH16 and to ensure capacity improvements are provided for, including the potential for rail corridor conversion in the long term.

At this afternoon’s ARC regional transport committee meeting, officers said it would be a trade off.

That while some commuters would prefer a quick ride straight into the city, others had destinations such as Unitec or in the catchment area so joining Great North Rd bus lanes at that point enabled people to get on and off there.

Bus lanes would ease the SH16 congestion!

While some thinking has been done, the officers called the investigation “a work in progress” that would take about another two months and involved several parts:

  • improving and reorganising the provision of bus services that connect to the SH16 corridor to provide enhanced services and to serve catchments for growing areas, including Westgate
  • provide infrastructure for a QTN corridor connecting Westgate with Waterview by constructing 3.5m bus priority lanes on SH16 and utilising existing bus lanes on Great North Rd to connect to the CBD. This will allow levels of service close to RTN standards as buses will be operating on the motorway unaffected by congestion
  • Future proof key interchanges such as Lincoln Rd and Te Atatu Rd to accommodate bus priority and bus interchange measures. reviews of bus services would provide for some local services to be re-designed to feed the high frequency QTN (Quality Transit Network) route. In the future, high quality interchanges will be constructed where there may be the opportunity for park and ride facilities.
  • ARTA and NZTA are progressing investigations to identify the footprint for the future Henderson to Albany RTN (Rapid Transit Network) to accommodate bus and rail modes

NZTA Regional Director Wayne McDonald told the meeting that it was now NZTA policy that for all big construction projects, provision be made for transport corridors involving other modes such as rail and this was seen in the present investigations into airport routes.

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4 Comments

 
  1. Matt L says:

    The council officers seem like they are being lazy on this one and just going through the motions of something they don’t want to do. The argument that people might want to take a longer route is preposterous, at Pt Chev the issue they raised could easily be solved by a busway style station, same at western springs.

    The stupid thing is they are investigating a full busway between Lincoln Rd and Westgate but just bus lanes for the rest of it, it should be a full busway all the way to at least Western Springs. Even sillier is the fact they are suggesting a full RTN be put along Lincoln Rd, this would have to be underground otherwise it will wipe out a heap of houses and businesses.

  2. jarbury says:

    I wonder at what point everyone will go “ummm… why don’t we just build a proper busway?”

  3. James Pole says:

    I can understand stopping it at Waterview since most of the buses (including the expresses from e.g. Helensville) go on/off the motorway there. Won’t be much benefit extending it further up the motorway since only a handful of expresses get on/off nearer the city.

    Could just change all the schedules so all services exit the motorway at Waterview and become all-stops to the City — like how the Helensville express operates.

    Ho hum.

  4. Luke says:

    Dont mind if it doesnt go past Waterview for now. Great North Road has reasonable bus lanes so congestion isnt as bad here.
    The main issue is that a massive project is going on between Waterview and Te Atatu, and if this doesnt involve at least design of a busway, and real future-proofing, then the North-West is going to be stuck without any RTN for a long time.

 

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