What are you doing tomorrow? I hope it involves walking, or taking the bus, or staying at home in bed all day. Why? Because it’s World Car Free Day.
You can find out more on the Governement’s new sustainability portal:
Living sustainably means living smarter. Through this site you’ll learn how to live smarter, reduce your impacts on the environment, and save money. You’ll find information to help you make important choices about how you use fuel, electricity and water and what to do with your rubbish.
And if you recognise the joke in the title of this post, perhaps you might like to consider switching to an organic cotton alternative – or a moon cup?
Wellington public transport has made another great leap forward. From the margin of a local community newspaper:
Bus users across Wellington can use their cellphones to find out when the next scheduled service will arrive. The service allows prospective passengers to find the times of the next three buses due by txting a four-digit number — the bus-stop ID number, displayed on bus-stop signs — to BUS (287). A reply will arrive within seconds.
Now note that this will not tell you when the next bus will actually arrive, but (presumably) give you the next three buses due as per the timetable. So not hugely helpful when your bus has not shown up for no apparent reason, and nor is it as cool as the digital signs I’ve seen in Auckland’s inner suburbs, but still a start. Now can they just sort out integrated ticketing? Kthxbai.
I’m sure you know that the Wellingtonista is a big fan of the trolley buses, and thinks that everyone who bitches about the wires overhead being an eyesore is an idiot. You probably think that it’s because we’re dirty leftie greenies that we’re fond of the wires, but the truth is, we like them because it’s hilarious when they go down. Like this morning, watching a trolley-bus having to get shunted by another bus out of a major Hataitai intersection. And getting to ride on the other side of Courtenay Place around marooned buses. And seeing Willis St totally blocked up with the corpses of trolley buses left lifeless. Actually it was lovely to see how friendly all the traffic was, and how quickly police and other people in shiny coats were there to direct traffic and keep things running. Sometimes Wellington is a surprisingly well-oiled machine. The official word after the jump:
Our very own Anti-Fascist Protective Rampart has been up for months now, and remains as ugly as ever.
Looking south towards Friedrichstraße *cough* I mean Abel Smith Street:
… and north towards Ghuznee Street. In the distance, over the wall, we see the symbols of capitalism brazenly and proudly flaunted:
All we are really missing are some sentry towers, razor wire, and anti-personnel mines. Somebody really needs to finish this damn “bypass” already.
At last, the final stage of the bypass has been opened, and the decades-long drama is drawing to an end. The DomPost reports…
At 6am yesterday, southbound traffic was directed from The Terrace Tunnel onto a one-way Vivian St via a new off-ramp.
At the same time, Buller and Ghuznee streets reverted to two-way streets.
Transit New Zealand project manager Jonnette Adams said some motorists had teething problems with the new layout, but were mostly courteous to each other. Some “tweaking” of intersection lights helped alleviate congestion on other routes linking with the bypass.
A team of engineers would be on hand today to make sure things ran smoothly, Ms Adams said.
Transit opened the northbound section of the bypass in December.
Meanwhile, frustrated Wellingtonians are turning to the Web to vent their anger at delays caused by the region’s transport infrastructure.
Aha! Haven’t they just.
So, how was it for you?
Two words: bloody buses.
Actually, here’s a few more. This particular Wellingtonista had to wait forty minutes last evening for even one bus to turn up on his route. Of course, when one did, it was packed to the gunnels, so it sailed by the stop, as did the next, and the next. Finally, one only moderately packed bus did find space to fit me on board, so I did eventually get home, but what irks me is that in the forty minutes spent waiting at the bus-stop, I saw three Kilbirnie buses go by (the second two weren’t even that full), and two Houghton Bay buses. I mean, if they’re going to cancel buses, couldn’t they be a little more even-handed about it all?
Bus routes affected by the cancellations are listed here. I find it hard to believe that there are no #1, #4 and #32 cancellations after 4:30 today. As a precaution, I plan to back-walk a few stops to the Beehive end of Lambton Quay, to ensure, at least, that I can get onto a bus that will take me home, should one deem to actually turn up.
With so much happening in this fair and glorious city of ours (it’s not just mine, it is all of ours) there’s a high chance that you’re gonna bump into some “out of towners”, especially the next few days as the city fills up with drunk penguins, herds of Elvis-es and not an unwelcome amount of nearly naked people … the rugby Sevens are on!
Whilst we all know that nearly everything is within walking distance of the Stadium (“It’s a very walkable city” was probably only just pipped by “Absolutely Positively Wellington”) we at the Towers are sure that there will be a high proportion of these tourists catching buses from ‘here’ to ‘there’.
And once on the bus they will be pleasantly surprised by how, as Wellingtonians leave the bus, there is a hearty, “Cheers drive!”
Well, actually it’s likely to be a, “Thank you” or even a, “Thanks driver” but why shouldn’t it be, “Cheers drive”?
Although we would hate you to think that we had an unnatural love for tunnels, we think it’s only fair to warn you that new lights have been installed at either end of the Hataitai/Mt Vic tunnel that are so bright that you’ll think you are outside in the sunshine already, even at night. It doesn’t make people honk any less though.
This week, the stretch of Adelaide Road where it intersects with Britomart Street/Herald Street, and then, a little further up the road, with Luxford Street.
As you can see on our hastily assembled little map on the right there, North-flowing traffic splits into two lanes once it gets past the Britomart/Herald intersection, so right-turning traffic gets its own turning lane into Luxford.
Now, this would work fine if there weren’t a couple of 5 minute parking spots (outside a dairy) in the straight-ahead lane (photo 2). Cars parked in that 5 minute spot (indicated by blue in the graphic) act as a roadblock, so once the turning lane hits a red light, traffic quickly backs up to the point where no-one can actually get into the straight-ahead lane (photo 3).
The fares have gone up! Well, for some of us they have. The new zones do make things a little simpler, but one gets the feeling the 1, 2 and 3 stage price hikes will generally outweigh the discounts the more rare 4 stage traveller will be making. Don’t know about you train users. You can fend for yourself.
If you’re a little confused about it all MetLink have excellent online info about the new zones and fares.
And to the bus-driver who looked stroppy at me this morning when I presented my brand new (but old-school $20 three-stage ten trip), and griped that I should be using one of the new cards, and made his decision to let me on regardless seem as if was the greatest show of magnaminity shown by a single person across the Wellington region this year, might I now say (having checked the rules): “Get stuffed! It’s valid to the 17th!”