Plans are underway to open up Auckland’s city centre by making it more difficult to use private transport.
Auckland Council has voted to adopt the Access for Everyone strategy, which would favour pedestrians over non-essential vehicles.
Trials are due to begin next year after a plan is put forward in March, NZ Herald reports.
“There are over 100,000 people working in the central city. Hotel blocks are soaring into the sky. Pedestrian numbers are doubling every few years. We have to do this. This is a lovely vision and an absolute necessity,” mayor Phil Goff says.
Public transport capacity is expected to rise by 370% in the next 10 years, which means more pedestrians, according to Auckland Council figures.
A carless Queen St was introduce in the 1970s by the Auckland City Council, but the experiment was soon scrapped.
However, Waitemata Local Board chairwoman Pippa Coom noted times have changed, with Queen St now hosting 13 times as many pedestrians as cars.
The Access for Everyone plan means cars could enter the inner city in one of eight “cells” around Queen St valley, but would be forced to leave the way they entered.
