At last – Basin Reserve, the Movie:
You can play this here on YouTube:
It has taken us a while, and we still haven’t got a sound track, but at long last we have uploaded our movie on a possible solution to the impasse on the Basin Reserve. Please feel free to forward this link to anyone you might think would be interested. And, we look forward to your feedback.
where is the movie?
Do we have to download the movie?
What’s the current issue with the Basin?
Movie now online… !
I’d like to offer a critique of the movie. First, it’s not actually very informative because it is too busy. Each screen flashes too fast for the viewer to be able to read the subtitle which is vital to understanding the diagrams. Second, the movie appears to have been put together in a short space of time and has low production values. I think that if a group is trying hard to communicate an idea to the wider public, the idea should be presented in an appealing way. Third, the movie could really do with a voiceover—giving a human touch to the Arch Center could go a long way towards befriending the public.
I also notice that there appear to be a multiple copies of the movie on YouTube. This will only further confuse those who seek out information on this issue.
cheers,
-tomek
Tomek, fair comments – there are 4 seconds per slide, which we thought was long enough, but perhaps we could give it more. Yes, production values are not as flash as we would like – but that’s all we can do – same as the music – issues of copyright, unless you can give us some carefully composed original score!
But anyway – what about the Design idea?
What about those that want to get from South to East (and vice versa)…? Surely increasing traffic through Newtown isn’t your intention, so there must be a way to slip between the two directions that your plan nominates, but where and how…?
I’ve watched it again but I had to pause after every slide to take time to think about it. My comments are:
(1) A light rail system is a great idea for Wellington. It’s not expensive and it would add tremendous amounts of convenience, mobility and connectivity to the residents and visitors; in particular the Train Station-Newtown-Kilbirnie-Airport line.
(2) You state that an overpass is a bad idea but you don’t say why. An average person might think that this is simply your opinion. How about showing some terrible overpasses from Detroit, London or Tokyo—the space underneath them is basically dead. It’s a good place for dodgy dealings and dumping rubbish. Overpasses create visual pollution, take away the land underneath them and cheapen the land values immediately around them.
(3) Tunnel, ever since I saw the Great Escape I’ve been in love with tunnels. They are great but it will be hard for people to swallow the cost. How can we better justify a tunnel other than saying that it’s a “simpler idea”? Construction-wise it’s not simpler at all, but the long-term benefits are great—less noise, less traffic, safer environment, more space for pedestrians, more parks, more space for future growth of the city (you could use that one to sell it to developers who might lobby for a tunnel if there is something in it for them).
(4) Linked green spaces—this is a fantastic idea and I believe that it is taught as a good practice in landscape architecture. I don’t think that anyone can argue with the value of having linked parks which would let one move from one end of the city to the other in a pleasant, green and peaceful environment.
Really nice idea, but how does one drive from south from Kent Terrace to Newtown via Sussex Street? Via a — ahem — flyover?
jeremy – follow the route of the yellow cars from Kent Tce to Adelaide Rd – they go over the top of the east west traffic to the Mt Vic tunnel. But, no, not in a flyover. They will be more or less on the line of the existing hillside. Its the east-west traffic from Mt Vic to Bypass that goes UNDER, ie in a short cut-and-cover tunnel.
As we say, to work with the land, not against it.
And then that fits in nicely with the Memorial Park tunnel.
m-d – re your comment – how do you get from Adelaide Rd to go east through the tunnel? Overall aim is to reduce intersections – most people from Newtown would go via Constable St rather than through the Mt Vic tunnel, and so that would continue. Those that continue north into Kent Tce (in our experience – very few) would need to turn on Kent Tce, on the flat, at a traffic light.
For anyone north of Constable and south of the Basin, wanting to travel east, they would have to opt for travelling almost into the CBD, or through a congested Newtown. That is certainly not an improvement on the status quo. I know that this is not a huge number of travellers, but, what I am trying to point out is that the AC proposal takes away some of the functionality of the existing Basin roundabout – this needs to be recognised and addressed in order to sell the proposal as a viable solution (if you dismiss it, which is open to you, you will need some pretty convincing argument – otherwise you run the risk of exposing an Achilles heal, which dilutes the impact of what you are proposing).
While they may not be heavily traversed routes, they still exist, and this proposal effectively deletes them.
Think Hataitai to hospital for example (or vice versa)- trips I’ve done frequently in the past (so assume many others must also).
I don’t believe that Newtown, with its 40km/hr restriction and already heavy traffic load should not be the target of any additional loadingw, and part of the reason for improving traffic flows around the basin is to address this I would have thought…
The Cambridge to Kent turnaround is probably workable (e.g. travelling from, say, Tasman Street to Hataitai, but it strikes me as a pretty ugly solution…
m-d heel. (Achilles…) Petty correction, sorry. All good comments, thank you – yes, going from Haitaitai to Newtown is simple (there is a slip road allowing people off the E-W route, to head south), whereas the reverse direction is not as smooth. Slip road not shown for clarity – but a doddle to fit in.
But the thing is: removing intersections means traffic flows more smoothly. What this would allow is for traffic to flow uninterrupted by opposing lanes of traffic – ie there are no head-on intersections as with the current congested basin. There will be stops for the traffic, for pedestrian crossings, so it won’t be speeding around here, but on the whole, traffic would flow a lot smoother.
Traffic from Newton, around the Basin, and across the flow to the Regional Wines and Spirits shop (ie the route to get to Mt Victoria) is actually reaaaaallllllly low. Negligible. Not worth them getting a overpass just for that. And the present intersection is dangerous anyway – far better to go up to the next set of lights.
If you are serious about planning for light rail, how about incorporating it into the final design and show it on the plan with the roads. Otherwise it looks like an afterthought.
And maybe a 3D perspective would help demonstrate why the western (higher) side of the Basin is logical for burying a road.
The incorporation of the Light Rail into the scheme is one of the most complex parts, you are right, but it is definitely not an afterthought. We think that running it around the other side of the Reserve from the cars will help it avoid clashes with the other vehicle traffic, so it has been shown routed around the outside as a first preference. But also, it could be partially undergrounded, and then landscaped over, to let the former Government House link to the Reserve and beyond.
Ultimately, NZTA will need to take responsibility for all the design of all the roads and rail links round here. We wouldn’t want to do all their job for them and take away all their fun.
“Traffic from Newton, around the Basin, and across the flow to the Regional Wines and Spirits shop (ie the route to get to Mt Victoria) is actually reaaaaallllllly low. Negligible. Not worth them getting a overpass just for that. And the present intersection is dangerous anyway – far better to go up to the next set of lights.”
I couldn’t agree more, but that doesn’t change my point – which is to say that by reducing the existing functionality, you open the proposal up to a criticism (whether negligible or otherwise) that might contribute to it being discounted from consideration – this would be a real shame. What I am saying is, don’t give the decision makers an easy ‘out’ – because you know they’ll be looking for one…
Guy,
When I tried to access the Arch Centre link (from EotF), my anti-virus shot up some warnings, along with a Java Virtual Machine Launcher warning about being “Unable to access jarfile \\ramgonet.com\smb\old.avi”.
McAfee picked up 3 warnings about trojans, detected as Expolit-CVE2008-5353…..if that makes any sense?
Can still see the page and comments, but no video.
Thanks SeaMonkey – we’re trying to get to the bottom of all that. Never happens to me any more (only happened once) – it seems that it is something that goes away once you’ve been there once? If you go back there now, I reckon it will work fine.
I don’t think our site itself is infected, but somehow there is a redirect hack on incoming links from our host’s server? Maybe?
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