Walking Popular For Eden Park

in Auckland Bus Cycling Featured Motorways RWC 2011 Trains by AKT — August 23, 2011 at 3:09 pm | 2 comments

The popularity of walking to Eden Park is the surprise in a report on the public transport figures for the Bledisloe Cup match on August 6 - the last big trial before the Rugby World Cup.
The data is in a report before tomorrow’s Auckland Transport board meeting.
And there is more good news on passen ger numbers.
July 2011 patronage was 5,368,936 passenger trips across PT, an increase of +2.7% compared to July 2010. For the 12 months ending July 2011 patronage was 65,903,949 passenger trips across PT, an increase of +8.4% compared to the 12 months ending July 2010.

• Walking appeared a popular option with large numbers on people coming in from the south and east. Mt Eden Village advised they had the biggest pre-event crowd they have ever experienced and that may have been the reason for the high movement from the east.

• Patronage to the event by PT was a record high at 45% of the crowd: 16,100 by rail (12,200 from CBD, 1950 from south, 1920 west), and 7,650 by bus. Patronage on the exit phase was slightly higher with 53% carried by PT: (15,600 to CBD, 2750 west), and 9,550 by bus. These are the highest figures achieved for public transport usage since free travel was introduced.

• Taxis although busy did not appear any better patronised that previous events. Coach movements were as expected with approximately 58 coaches parked around Eden Park which accounted for between 2,500-3,000 people.

• The report says the new pedestrian operations plan at Britomart worked well. There were a few teething problems with signage and educating regular travellers but it did assist in ensuring the station did not become overcrowded.  “Overall, the ingress phase went extremely well whilst the exit phase, although clearing everyone in the required timeline, had an operational issue with the trains. It was a credit to Veolia that although experiencing a 10-15 minute delay with a train issue at Kingsland Station, they were able to work around the problem and have frequencies return to 5 minutes shortly after the initial delay. “

• The Resident Only parking scheme worked well and it is a credit to the parking team for the effort they have put in to get permits to residents and businesses within the area. The Eden Park Community Liaison Group were happy with the operation with them advising that “we got it right”. There has been a big increase in Eden  Park Residents parking permits issued,  from 1,800 in November to 4,814 to date.

• Traffic operations worked well with no apparent problems in New North Road )/Kingsland Shops with pedestrian‟s vehicles. The NNR closure went in at half time and was removed atapproximately one hour post match.

• Dominion Road was busy, but it appeared to flow much better than in previous events. The Walters Road / Cromwell Street check point was busy but the vehicles going through were processed veryquickly.
• Taxis are still a problem getting to this check point but they were quickly exited via Onslow Road.