Wellington’s new route

It’s been a long time com­ing, but finally the buses are run­ning through the thor­ough­fare formerly known as Man­ners Mall.

With clipped bus wing mir­rors, bowled down ped­es­tri­ans, and gen­er­al chaos pre­dicted by some, I decided to get down to Man­ners Street and check out the new bus route.

Man­ners Mall

Ol’ Man­ners Mall has gone, daddy, gone and in its place is the miss­ing link of Man­ners Street. Buses were hap­pily run­ning in both dir­ec­tions, and even though the street looks fairly nar­row, there seems to be ample room for buses to travel in both dir­ec­tions.

Though launch­ing on a Sunday – the light­est bus day of the week – does­n’t give the full effect of a week­day rush hour. We’ll know what that’s like in 24 hours.

Ped­es­tri­ans were hap­pily jay­walk­ing across the street, but wer­en’t mind­lessly step­ping out into the traffic. All the ones I saw did look both ways before cross­ing, and indeed it’s pos­sible to take advant­age of traffic lights on red at either end to pick a safe time to cross. But again, things will be dif­fer­ent at peak traffic times.

Wil­lis Street

Buses are going up Wil­lis Street too now. About a year ago, I had a bus driver preach to the bus about the futil­ity and impossib­il­ity of buses mak­ing a left-hand turn from Wil­lis into Man­ners.

Well, the bus I was on made that turn with no trouble, though the oppos­ing lane was empty. It seems the road has been widened at the inter­sec­tion, which should mean that both dir­ec­tions can get around the corner without crunch­ing.

Mer­cer Street

Devoid of buses, Mer­cer Street was strangely quiet. I think the 24 will still travel down Mer­cer, oth­er­wise it will be left to the pleas­ure of the auto­mobile.

With its role as an import­ant bus road taken away, Mer­cer Street seems curi­ously recon­nec­ted with its former oth­er half, the bit that became Civic Square. Could Mer­cer Street have a future as a shared space for ped­es­tri­ans, motor­ists and motor­cyc­lists, as well as part of a gate­way to the water­front?

Dix­on Street

Dix­on Street is a bit of a mess. All the pre­vi­ous bus stop space has been con­ver­ted to car parks. The street is packed full of cars, which is fine, but the ped­es­tri­an exper­i­ence has­n’t been improved.

Dix­on’s always been a bit shabby, and surely with the buses gone, now would be a good time to smarten it up a bit. New foot­paths – wider foot­paths – and more of a link to Aro Park.

If Mem­ph­is Belle cafe can come along and make its little corner of Dix­on Street rather lovely, think what could hap­pen if the coun­cil put a bit of effort into their part.

Lower Cuba Street

Ok, this is the one we really have our eye on.

The buses have gone, but more cars are in. Vehicle entry into Lower Cuba has to be done via a care­ful right-hand turn from Man­ners Street, and over a foot­path-level hump.

All the signs are there for Lower Cuba Street to become a really lovely shared space that both people-on-foot and people-in-cars can use togeth­er.

But what about Rebel Sport’s recently con­struc­ted mall-like blank facade on the old James Smith’s build­ing? Will the Down­town Loc­al fit in? What of that crazy old boarded-up shop? Will mun­ters try to use Lower Cuba as a short­cut between Tarana­ki and Wake­field? And will Lower Cuba become the new Upper Cuba? Will it be done in time for the Rugby World Cup?!

Let’s hope some­thing nice hap­pens there.

Emo watch

As we all know, Man­ners Mall was a favour­ite hang-out spot of the young emos of Wel­ling­ton, who liked to smoke, spit and swear and gen­er­ally loiter about.

Now with the mall gone and TimeZone mov­ing out, where have these youth moved to? If you spot any groups of angry look­ing, black-clad young ‘uns in the CBD, let us know. Like the Pow­el­liphanta snails, we’d like to know that they’ve been safely relo­cated to a new hab­it­at.