Waka Kotahi reneges on clearways
The Paremata Residents Association (PRA) is angry that Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency is not honouring what it believes was a commitment to get rid of clearways on SH1 through Paremata and Plimmerton.
One of those commitments was to ‘‘remove the clearways through Mana’’ in conjunction with the opening of Transmission Gully.
Waka Kotahi has now said the clearways will remain open, once Transmission Gully opens, and no decisions relating to their future will be made until consultations with various organisations is held between six and 12 months after it opens.
Unless the situation changes, this means that after having to put up with the clearways for more than 16 years, road users, visitors, pedestrians, cyclists and local residents will have to use the clearways for another year, at least. That is irresponsible as there is no reason to believe that the clearways should be necessary when Transmission Gully finally opens.
Residents are not averse to reviewing commitments that were made in the past. In this case, however, we continue to respect the reasons behind Transit’s commitment which anticipated just two lanes through Mana immediately after the opening to avoid providing excess traffic capacity, and to discourage traffic from continuing to use the existing route.
If the objectives of building Transmission Gully are to be realised it is imperative that as much traffic as possible is diverted to the new route, and that data required for future planning is gathered with the clearways closed.
Closure of the kerbside lanes could be carried out very quickly and cheaply, requiring just installation of flexible PVC road stakes (‘‘traffic separators’’) nailed to the road, allowing for roadside parking, safer entrance to private driveways and commercial entrances, turning lanes at intersections and a safe corridor for cyclists outside the parked cars.
No other changes would probably need to be made initially, except some minor sign changes and some adjustments to traffic signals. The changes could be made virtually overnight and could be easily reversed if found to cause significant problems.
Feedback from residents on this matter has been sought many times over the years, including for the Porirua Growth Strategy published in 2019. Invariably the feedback has supported the legitimate expectations that the clearways would go.
The views of residents adjoining the existing highway were canvassed again several weeks before Christmas resulting in replies representing 50 households. All but one of those households indicated support for closure of the clearways in conjunction with the opening of Transmission Gully.
People expect the concerns of residents to be respected by their council representatives.
We hope that Waka Kotahi and PCC will change their current positions to avoid this becoming an even greater matter of contention in the next few weeks.