There has been a lot of talk about a bus interchange at Manukau – to complement the rail station – in recent months and years, but not much detail. It seems that behind the scenes quite a lot of work has been going on to sort out the details, and at the Council’s Auckland Plan committee meeting this coming Tuesday, important steps to making the interchange a reality will be taken. A report on the interchange highlights the progress that has been made in terms of developing a master plan for “Lot 59” – the site it will be built on.
The interchange is to be located on the site that’s currently a surface level parking lot (like most of Manukau) between the new train station and the main Council building. This is shown in the map below:
This is a good location for the interchange because it will act as a useful “bridge” linking MIT and the train station with the shopping centre and the current “heart” of Manukau city centre further to the east. It is a pity that the former Manukau City Council couldn’t stump up with a little bit of extra money to have extended the rail line through to this site – but perhaps the bus interchange will go some way to gloss over that past mistake, especially if it brings new development with it: Essentially moving the centre towards the new transport infrastructure that is its best hope of adding vitality to this poorly conceived place.
So it’s great to see that looking in a bit closer we can see that the plan clearly isn’t to just build a bus interchange on the site – but for that interchange to be part of a broader redevelopment of what is a fairly key cornerstone site for the whole of Manukau City:
It looks like the goal is to turn Putney Way – the street on the northern side of the site – into something resembling a shared space. This is excellent as it would reinforce Putney Way as the key retail pedestrian focused street within Manukau City and give the centre something of an east/west spine. Slowly looks like Manukau City could at last develop some real place quality.
Careful phasing of the traffic signals at the northwest corner of the site will be important to enable easy bus-train transfers, as well as making sure we don’t repeat the mistakes of the Newmarket train station and effectively hide the bus interchange behind a row of shops.
Clearly visible above is that the more compact ‘sawtooth’ station layout has been selected for this site. This certainly makes for a concentrated and therefore highly legible place to find your bus, but because of the need for buses to reverse out to continue their routes it does add an inefficient time delay to each service. This is a design typology that is generally more appropriate to inter-city terminus type stations rather than intra-city through routing stations. Below is the Manukau City section of the New Network, clearly showing the through routing of the services that will use the station.
Also good to see is the development including new commercial buildings along Manukau Station Rd which will provide a built edge to this sprawling site and contain the new station. A 3D image of the site shows how it could develop over time – including what looks like an interesting design for the bus interchange itself and a new building of some scale at the western end of the site:
The report notes that Auckland Transport has $10m budgeted to deliver the PT interchange over the next couple of years and that it’s a critical component of implementing the new bus network in the south. So we should actually see something built in the fairly near future – even if the full build-out of the site is quite some time away.
Probably the only thing that concerns me about the report is the emphasis that’s placed on replacing the parking that the site is currently used for:
Lot 59 currently has 546 surface car parks of which 178 are leased with the rest used by Council fleet vehicles and staff parking. The realisation of the Masterplan will see these existing car parks displaced by development. A number of options for alternative solutions are being investigated as part of the comprehensive Manukau Car Park Management Strategy.
The Ronwood Ave multi storey car park building opened in 2012 with a capacity of 680 cars. The facility was built to enable a reduction in the amount of surface car parking areas within Manukau central and allow future development. The Ronwood Ave car park is not currently at capacity and there is space to potentially accommodate fleet and staff car parking from Lot 59. There is however a charge to park in the building ($4/day for earlybird all day parking) and a number of options are being considered including a temporary car park on the ‘South Hayman’ site immediately south of MIT Campus on Manukau Station Road.
It is important to note that these are options at this stage and Council officers are working with HR, Fleet Management and the PSA to find appropriate solutions to address the loss of free staff car parking, alternative locations for customer (including Service Centre and Library users) and fleet car parking. The Lot 59 Masterplan will not be implemented until satisfactory solutions to these issues have been agreed. This report does not seek a resolution on any car parking issues.
Noting that the Ronwood Ave building is “not currently at capacity” is perhaps the most hilarious underplaying of the debacle that project turned into. Let us just hope that this project isn’t used as an excuse for resurrecting the South Hayman carpark building proposal – perhaps the stupidest project ever proposed by Auckland Transport. The idea that Manukau City has a shortage of parking is like saying Antarctica has a shortage of ice.
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It appears to be more of a bus park than a bus interchange. What a waste of prime land.
I don’t see how that bus parking can work safely.
Do buses have to either back in or back out on the space?
Someone will walk behind a bus and get squashed
No No No Not a sawtooth bus stop. They are terrible, buses always end up banging into things like other buses, canopies and people… Please a beter design, perhaps talk to the drivers to get an idea of what actually works.
No to a sawtooth bus interchange as well. They are terrible as evidenced by use of the ones at Paraparaumu Rail Station and elsewhere. Much better to be like the one at the Wellington Central rail station. There are four platforms that the buses can pull up at and never spend more than the time it takes to load or drop passengers. For buses that terminate there, there is a central parking area for both trolley and diesel buses. And of course having people using the interchange depends on integrated fares. When is the detail of this coming AT?. We have four good interchange stations on the Northern Busway and AT, in their wisdom, will remove the few integrated fares by September 7. All of these stations the buses pass through and there is parking at Albany. No sawtooth design here.
Is there actually a need for a sawtooth stop? In the image it looks like there are a whole heap of buses there; I feel like there won’t be that many buses there at once, so perhaps no need for angled spaces?
Seems odd solution. Hamilton’s central bus station has sawtooth parking too if I remember correctly.
You would be right – Hamilton does.
Then again, the Transport Centre there is the terminus for all urban and regional routes. The only through ones are Intercity services, and they depart from the roadside.
The underground bus interchange in Chch worked pretty well with buses coming in one side driving around a crescent shaped tunnel to the appropriate gate. The only problem I heard was that the tunnel was too narrow and the turn too tight, but otherwise it worked well and led to a substantial increase in ridership.
Before the earthquake, this was to be replaced by better underground interchange on the site of the current surface bus interchange on Lichfield Street.
I agree that the sawtooth design is terrible and seems like the equivalent of the current capacity constraint problem at Newmarket where the trains have to back out.
I dont know why Auckland seems so convinced that it has nothing to learn from any other cities in NZ, whether Christchurch, Wellington or Hamilton (as commenters above have pointed to.) Frustrating. I dont have much experience of the Wellington system, but prior to the earthquake, Chch was doing great things with its bus network.
I see a new interchange is being planned for 2014 and is being designed now. Why not piggyback off that:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/city-centre/8924916/Bus-interchange-work-to-start-next-year
Just posted my thoughts on the Lot 59 concept including bus interchange my end which includes some very rough mock ups (that need to be updated again). Matt and patrick how do I really go about sharing material if I have posted on a similar topic over at my own blog? Guest post, linking back (which often doesnt go down well with you guys)
Sawtooth interchange really bizzare, especially considering many services are through routed.
More common for coach terminals where services wait for 5/10 minutes, not for urban buses with high throughput.
Only advantage in less pedestrians crossing the road, but as there will be development on other side of interchange, buses will have to deal with pedestrians anyway.
The saw tooth layout seems stupid and a sure fire way to really slow down buses, especially through routed buses. I believe there are shallow saw tooth options that save space over a conventional layout without the big downsides of a full saw tooth design.
It also looks like the most direct route from the railway station to the buses is by crossing behind the buses. It’s human nature to try and take the most direct path. Sawtooth does seem like the right solution here.
Buses on the route map don’t even go onto Putney Way, so to enter the interchange where it is and then do the rest of the route means that Northbound buses will have to go:
Left Gt South Rd into Manukau Station Rd
Right into Davies Ave
Right into Putney Way
Right into Osterley Way
Right into the interchange, trying to avoid colliding with other buses reversing to get out of it
BACKWARDS to be able to get out of the sawtooth stop
Right back into Davies Ave
Right onto Ronwood Ave
Left onto Gt South Rd
That’s 540 degrees of right turns and a reverse movement! Seriously if I wanted to sabotage the New Network and reinforce the image of buses as clumsy and indirect, this is exactly what I’d do.
Whoops logic error. Not as many turns as I remembered the Manukau Stn Rd / Osterley Way intersection wrong.
Revised:
Right into Davies Ave
Right into Osterley Way
Left into the interchange, trying to avoid colliding with other buses reversing to get out of it
BACKWARDS to be able to get out of the sawtooth stop
Right back into Davies Ave
Right onto Ronwood Ave
Left onto Gt South Rd
but still a lot of clumsy turns and a reverse movement.
Ugh, another typo. Wish we could edit posts! “Right into Davies Ave” should be “Left Gt South Rd into Manukau Station Rd”
On another matter, someone prviously posted a comment regarding the location of the station and how not extending it a little further was a blessing in disguise. Allows for the shifting of the “heart” of the area and a new start on a blank space. Interesting point and seems to be supported by some of the graphics above.
What everyone else is saying: sawtooth bus bays with reversing movements for through routed buses? Completely insane!
With apology that I don’t know the proposed frequencies on each of the coloured routes: This smells of serious overdesign. Surely appropriate bus stops on Davies Avenue would suffice; would be closer to the station; and would leave the proposed site for some more attractive urban development.
There is plenty of room on Davies Ave for bus bays segregated by destination groups to avoid the problems when buses stop at one stop in bunches. Terminating buses should occupy the bus stop for the minimum time and be sent to lay over somewhere nearby.
Isn’t a bus park what depot yards are for? Why have one in the centre of a town centre node? If the buses are on duty and not going around isn’t this losing capacity?Seems to me everyone to afraid just to turn the switch fire up the bus network with priority now, then you will see what we need for greater efficiency with the existing 1000 buses. We are just stifling growth and making turning the corner harder and more expensive. Not to mention adding tonnes of emissions above.
It is a terminus for most bus services in the area, and a major interchange. Buses need to layover at the termini for recovery time, crew changes, resheduling etc. It’s basically impossible to keep buses moving constantly if you want to maintain any kind of timetable efficiency. While this may or may not be the best design, a bus interchange facility is definitely needed.
Right in a metro centre? There is plenty of land nearby to provide this facility.
Of course right in a metro centre, it’s the perfect place for a transit station! …but I do get what you mean. Consider what the alternative is if you split up the passenger station in the middle of the metro centre and the operations station somewhere outside the centre:
Option 1: Combined transit station. Buses enter the station, dwell and layover for 2 to 10 minutes at the platform for timekeeping. People wanting a particular bus or transferring have plenty of time to see their bus and get on.
Option 2: Split. Buses enter the smaller passenger station, stop at stops for 30-40 seconds to drop off passengers, change signs to out of service. Drive out of the station, around the block and a kilometre or so away to a operations facility (5-6 minutes). Buses dwell and layover to 3 to 12 minutes for timekeeping. Drive 5-6 minutes back to passenger station, hope you don’t get all the red lights or some traffic hold up on the way and can stick to timetable, then stop for 30-40 seconds to collect passengers.
The latter option would take a lot more time and require even longer recovery times due to the double circulation in and out of the metro centre. You could be adding an extra fifteen minutes out of service running to routes that are mostly going to be 20-30 minutes long in service.
Splitting the operations from the passenger area is probably a good idea in very space constrained (i.e. expensive land) urban environments such a the CBD core, but out at Manukau there isn’t exactly a lack of space to build a decent sized bus terminal. No point in loading up huge extra operating costs to make the bus station footprint half the size.
I’ve no issue with buses stopping there for a few minutes, more the type of parking that this plan has. It would be better to utilise Putney Way as well, in order to accommodate parallel parking (kinda like Britomart really). I think the New Lynn interchange is a great example. Also, we shouldn’t be wasting land at Manukau just because of what it is now. The idea to future proof as per New Lynn, for apartments or retail / office to be built over it is essential. I hope any possibility of carrying rail on through is taken into account as part of the future proofing.
Bryce, I don’t see the current Britomart set up as any sort of ideal; the place is far too bus dominated. Much better to make Putney way into a street for people and keeping buses out is essential to achieving that. Manukau already suffers from poor performance by auto domination almost everywhere so a vital part of any design intervention there should be to constrain vehicles from some of it at least.
Buses are great, but not when the dominate a place like any other volume of vehicles.
Other than the reversing problem [and the distance to the train platforms] I like the way that these great big machines are concentrated together by this design. Both for legibility of use and for minimising place disbenefit by bus quantity.
I agree about the auto domination Patrick. Remove as many cars as possible. Remember the proposed Davies Ave rebuild that will reduce traffic volumes.
The buses shouldnt be stopping at all. Another lesson from Chch is that the buses work best when they sweep straight through and out the other side. That is yet another problem with the “system” (for want of a better word – thoyugh clusterf&ck might work as well) at Britomart.
Buses should only stop at the end of their runs on either side of the city so they dont take up any valuable urban land. Presuming one day Manukau is able to be described as “urban”.
Ah, Nick, thanks for that; that explains a lot.
Ok yes I understand a bit better. But there are probably places on the approaching roads (look at all the pay and display parking) where buses could park for a couple of minutes for scheduling correction, breaks or swapping drivers etc. Especially if we fired this up sooner rather than later which we should do for everybody and the environment. It is like most believe but we are waiting for the whole church to be built before we do anything and lose some believers in the process. And agree with other posts ..reversing no.
In fact if the primary bus routes are changing why not use the existing bus lay over areas at the north end of Westfield in the meantime? Close to the food court etc? And also give people a chance to board there on the ones about to go. This is what they are used to now is it not?
On Leyton Way -north east of the town centre directly outside the foodcourt..which makes some sense are the existing primary bus stops for Manukau Town Centre . Surely even Westfield can see the benefits of leaving them there,Patronage directly at the door, with shelter no less and no changes. Or are their other issues?
Plenty of space there to make a station that is working well and only recently complete i.e. New Lynn in Auckland. Saw tooth bus parks make no sense, and because buses are driven by people we’ll have situations whereby two are parked so close together you’ll be squeezing out the back down between two grubby buses. Moving the surface parking for their fleet into their newly built and empty carpark makes sense but the worry about losing free parking puzzles me, where’s the concern for PT users everytime they jack up the fares?
In all other respects this looks like a really great plan and upgrade for Manukau.
Interesting to note the Auckland Transport Public Transport Interchange Guidelines. http://www.aucklandtransport.govt.nz/about-us/publications/ManualsandGuidelines/Documents/Public%20Transport%20Interchange%20Design%20Guidelines%20v1%201.pdf
Here is what it says about sawtooth interchanges:
Operational Effectiveness – low
Flexibility and Simplicty – low
Land Use efficiency – high
Safety and Security – medium
However drive in/drive out sawtooths as seen at Wolverhampton are rated much better- http://www.networkwestmidlands.com/Wolverhampton/BusStation.aspx
Operational Effectiveness – high
Flexibility and Simplicty – medium
Land Use efficiency – medium
Safety and Security – medium
if buses need to park up for more than 5 minutes surely they can loop around the street. No shortage of low amenity land around like Davies Ave or Manukau Station Road.
Weren’t there original plans for a pedestrian underpass to the station, going under Davis Avenue ? This would make the bus-train transfer a lot more palatable. It would be a pity to arrive on a late bus, wait at a pedestrian red light on Davis Ave, and hear your train depart. .
With 10 minute frequencies it really won’t matter. Though I do agree here.
I agree also. But think too late for now. We just need to fire this bus priority baby up. The train station is there is it not? I understand this is a new thing but again phasing in too painful just do it you have control of the road reserve yes or no?
Why would you want an underpass – there seems to be a zebra crossing shown to the train station. Just walk over the street….
Why, why, why? Reversing buses. Really?
How hard is it to actually copy a good layout?
e.g. How about the Perth Busport? http://www.transperth.wa.gov.au/timetablePDFs/BusStationMaps/Esplanade%20Busport.pdf
I agree – the reason sawtooth platforms are not commonly used in urban buses networks elsewhere is because the frequencies on many routes are too high and the dwell times too short to enable them to work effectively when buses have to reverse out, i.e. logical and compelling reasons that seem to have been overlooked in this case.
Does anyone else think that a better solution would simply be to develop on-street stops on Davies Ave in front of train station? The southern end of Davies Ave could perhaps be turned into a transit only bus mall(Portland style). If you wanted to improve legibility for passengers you could take all the buses over the western side and develop a half-offline platform, such as Otara, while providing the layover somewhere else.
Either way, on-street stops close to train station entrance would cost less in terms of CAPEX and OPEX and would seem to be more effective for 1) passengers who are travelling through this point and 2) passengers who are connecting to the train. Deviating large volumes of services into an offline station that is both difficult to access and has inefficient internal circulation is likely to end in tears.
There’s also on-street stops as the buses approach Manukau (as shown in the post), so anybody who is looking to access those areas is probably better getting off and walking before they have to tangle with this multi-headed monster.
Stu quoting you: ” Does anyone else think that a better solution would simply be to develop on-street stops on Davies Ave in front of train station? The southern end of Davies Ave could perhaps be turned into a transit only bus mall(Portland style). If you wanted to improve legibility for passengers you could take all the buses over the western side and develop a half-offline platform, such as Otara, while providing the layover somewhere else.”
Want to catch up with coffee soon and have a chat on Manukau? I did last night update my own mock up of the Manukau bus interchange and will update again tonight after I got some good feedback this afternoon on the first draft.
Grand idea Stu. I could also see the old council carpark being a block of 4 buildings with pedestrian access in the streets between.
The Auckland Plan Committee endorsed the Lot 59 Concept – the Manukau Interchange this afternoon without even a whimper of questioning. I am not particularly happy and will be lobbying for a redesign away from the sawtooth my end. In saying that I will also go redesign what I drew up taking into account Patrick’s comments. This especially if the interchange I drew up hits capacity with all 20 buses there. Might cut capacity down to 12 seeming buses will be moving frequently. But come on Council and AT, this was a 70s plan and design, not a design for the 21st Century and a Super Metropolitan Centre
Yes, Buses going to Britomart should stop on Quay and Customs streets seeing as they will be moving on. Both streets border the train station anyway.
With that, the open space out front of Britomart could be reclaimed as a public (only) square, eventually linking a pedestrianised lower Queen and Quay Sts. It would be a natural meeting point for tourists, workers, etc and could be an extremely vibrant place on the doorstep of the waterfront. A grass square ringed by seating, a fountain perhaps….
KLK until such a time as we are less reliant on buses to move so many Aucklanders, with, I don’t know, an underground electric rail system for example, I can’t see that downtown street side resource being liberated from machines. Much as I like your thinking, we’ve just got to stop those buses somewhere. However, the little lanes behind and beside Britomart, where there are narrower footpaths and retail attractors, they could be liberated from bus torment, and i hear work is happening to do just that.
And I do think that is the greater priority; keep the buses on the big roads where there are wide pavements and more roadspace for them to manoeuvre and get those lanes humming for humans… this should also create the opportunity to finetune the two big east/west roads through the removal of so many bus turns into the Britomart block itself.
Ah you meant the Britomart lanes in your earlier comment Patrick. I agree. That’s a terrible situation. The piece of Queen St works pretty well. Incorporating a piece of Quay instead of the lanes would be pretty handy.
I personally can’t see a better way of designing this bus station considering factors like layover time, location, and pedestrian focused streets. Having loads of buses along the streets of Davies or Putney are bad outcomes for me, they create massive barriers on narrow streets. Maybe Leeds and leichester bus stations are examples to learn from.
Does this include space for “Inter City” and “Naked Bus” passengers drop off and pickup?
One of the problems I have as an older hobbly person with luggage is that in Wanganui these 2 organizations drop off in different places and they are quite a distance from the Local transport bus routes, something that should be avoided.
Hamilton has the saw tooth design for these long haul buses and they move through the dame hub as the local buses which seems like a good idea. In my bus exchanges there I have not seen any problems with the saw tooth but then I have not been there when there is a rush on and most of the local buses seemed to put and drop off parallel parked on the street.
Is there any way that the Bus and train station can be so connected that the log off from bus to the train log on can be obviated. I feel that the more seamless the exchange the greater the encouragement to use the “inter change” from one mode to the other. Especially if the concourse could be ticketed at entry and the two modes only an escalator or lift apart?
What are the latest developments on this?
Is there any consideration being given to link the Mall and business areas with covered ways or indoor connections for pedestrians?