Colombo Street overbridge looking towards Sydenham.

Changes to our planning approach to the Brougham Street and Moorhouse Avenue area

It has been a while since we last updated you on our joint planning for the Brougham Street and Moorhouse Avenue area and quite a lot has changed.

Earlier this year the Government announced the NZ Upgrade programme and included funding to be spent on Brougham Street to improve safety, provide better travel choice and support a more reliable freight route through to Lyttelton Port. In a practical sense, this means that planning for Brougham Street is likely to accelerate ahead of planning for the rest of our project area.

Knowing this, and knowing that funding for design improvements in the wider area may be some years away, we want to provide you with a good idea of where our high-level planning has got to and reassure you that further opportunities to provide feedback will occur in future planning phases as and when funding becomes available. 

But first, let's have a brief recap.

A quick recap

You may recall that we asked you how transport in this area affects the way you live, work and play and sought feedback from you on:

• How we might make it safer and easier for people to travel about these busy streets
• On changes we could make to provide more transport choices and to encourage people to walk, cycle and use public transport
• on ways to maintain or improve accessibility and connectivity in the area for all modes of transport
• And ways to integrate the transport system with adjoining land uses

When we received your feedback there were some common themes that covered much of the project area. Many people felt it was difficult to get around, with cars, freight, buses, pedestrians and cyclists all competing to travel through the same busy area. People thought the area was congested at peak times and people noted that there were crashes and near-misses, especially at intersections.

Here are some of the key things people told us:
● Safety is an issue, particularly around intersections, driveways and schools
● People feel unsafe using pedestrian crossings as many drivers do not see or give way to pedestrians and cyclists
● Driver behaviour can cause safety issues for cyclist and pedestrians
● The layout of some intersections could be adjusted to make them safer for cyclists
● Drivers and cyclists find it hard to turn right at busy intersections due to the volume of traffic
● There is a lot of congestion along Brougham Street and Moorhouse Avenue
● Pedestrian islands do not feel large enough to protect people from vehicles, especially if they are walking with a pram and/or toddlers

Re-imagining how we travel

Together, we have an opportunity to re-imagine and redesign how people use the roads in this area. If a large number of us switch from cars to walking, cycling and public transport, we can reduce congestion and reduce pollution. We can also make it easier to get around for those who need a work vehicle, such as tradespeople and freight drivers.

Our project has identified corridors (in yellow) which could prioritise buses, corridors (in green) that could have improved cycling and walking connections, the Brougham Street corridor (in red) with a multi-use focus and so on. The map below shows how different streets might function in future. Keep in mind that apart from Brougham Street, these are high-level concepts which are not yet funded.

Brougham Street is different because on behalf of the government, Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency, will be implementing changes to Brougham Street as part of the NZ Upgrade suite of projects. All NZ Upgrade projects are designed to save lives, get our cities moving and boost productivity post Covid-19. Waka Kotahi will begin talking to you about plans for the Brougham corridor early in 2021. The government has allocated $40 million to this project.

For the other streets, the priority is to focus on safety improvements at intersections. This is where small change in the short-term could make a big difference. The council and Waka Kotahi also want  to plan for higher bus frequency, particularly along Colombo Street, including possible bus priority measures.

We encourage you to look at this map to see how streets could be prioritised and changed over time, but keep in mind that nothing is decided yet and there will need to be further funding decisions taken and further planning and design phases worked through before long-term change can take place. Conversations with the community would also be held in these future stages.

An ongoing conversation

Across the city, we are looking at longer-term policy and planning changes that will make our city a better place. This includes parallel investigations to this one looking at ways to improve public transport and the 'visioning' work for the Christchurch region, undertaken by the Greater Christchurch Partnership. We encourage you to email us at the email address below if you have any questions or wish to provide us with further feedback.

Kind regards,

The Brougham-Moorhouse Project Team

More information

Please email us if you have any questions at bm@nzta.govt.nz