Barnett: Do more of what we’ve done and see if we get a different result
A few days ago the Herald published an op-ed from Michael Barnett, the CEO of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce. I found it an odd article as it was never quite clear about what Barnett’s key point was, seemingly jumping between two of them with liberal amounts of anecdata, logic leaps and outright incorrect data sprinkled in.…
41 Comments Odd Compromise for AT Board?
A couple of weeks back new mayor Phil Goff announced that he was considering not appointing councillors to the board of Auckland Transport. Under the legislation that established Auckland Council (and Auckland Transport), up to two councillors can be appointed to the Board, although there is no requirement for this appointment to be made.…
Trademe, power tools, and “filtering” in housing markets
A discussion on Twitter recently highlighted an important – and hard-to-understand – dimension of housing markets. Namely, what is the link between new construction – which is usually expensive – and housing affordability? People who would have bought pricey new apartments instead compete for existing houses.…
Stunning Lightpath Timelapse
Lightpath is only 11 months old but already feels like an important part of Auckland’s fabric. As of the end of October nearly 200,000 trips by bike had been made over it and many more will have walked it. The path is great by day but perhaps even more impressive at night when then LEDs kick in and dance around, following users as they make their way across the structure.…
Why is ATs website so customer unfriendly?
Yesterday afternoon I noticed a tweet from reader Tina Plunkett asking where she could top-up her HOP card on Ponsonby Rd. HALP I'm in ponsonby, where hop top up? #Reallyshouldknowthis
— /ɛkˈstɔːʃ(ə)nɪst/ (@tina_plunkett) November 7, 2016 While this isn’t something I ever look up, I knew I’d seen it on the AT website before and as I had some spare time I thought I’d try and be helpful by looking it up for her.…
What do garage bands and tech startups have in common?
Russell Brown’s Public Address article on the impending closure and redevelopment of the King’s Arms music venue got me thinking. Russell highlighted the importance of certain types of physical spaces for a music scene’s ongoing vitality:
What the King’s Arms and the Powerstation have in common is that they are reasonably large rectangular boxes, which makes them ideal rock ‘n’ roll venues.…
Photo of the Day: The Crystal Palace
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Development update: November 2016
I’ve just updated the RCG Development Tracker for November – it’s now got almost 800 developments listed, across all property sectors but with a focus on higher density residential.
The ones which didn’t make it
In the last month, we’ve had a bit of media coverage about developments being cancelled.…
Increasing capacity on our trains
Ridership on Auckland’s trains has experienced fantastic growth over the last few years, increasingly a staggering 70% in just three years to 17.3 million trips as of the end of September. The positive thing is that the growth remains strong at nearly 20% per annum. …
Sunday reading 6 November 2016
Hi and welcome back to Sunday Reading. Here is a collection of stories I found interesting over the week. Please add your links in the comments below.
UN Habitat III in Quito came to a close a couple weeks ago. Here Michael Kimmelman describes the urban flavour and urgency of the conference that sits in stark contrast to Habitat I which largely focused on conventional environmentalism and improving the rural habitat- “The Kind of Thinking Cities Need“, The New York Times.…
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