Source: Radio New Zealand
Auckland’s City Rail Link. (File photo) Supplied
Auckland’s City Rail Link (CRL), is not enough to revitalise the CBD, an entrepreneur says.
The $5.5 billion rail transport project was due to be completed later this year.
Andrew Barnes, the founder of Perpetual Guardian and former chairperson of the now merged Regional Faculties Auckland, told Nine to Noon, more needed to be done to make the centre an attractive place that people want to come to, with things such as exhibitions and arts and cultural events.
He questioned why people would use the CRL if the centre was “not an attractive place to come”.
“It’s going to make movement of people more efficient but our challenge now is, a lot of office blocks are pretty much empty and people are working less in the CBD. Why will they come in if it’s better to shop in Newmarket?”
Andrew Barnes, Perpetual Guardian founder. (File photo) Supplied
He told said the policy to make Auckland a world class city was disjointed and he wanted to see changes in the way the city was governed.
“I would support comments the mayor has made which is we need to change the funding model… at the end of the day if we don’t have our principal city firing on all cylinders that does affect the rest of the country.”
If things weren’t sorted soon, Barnes believed the city would be having the same debate in 20 years.
Barnes said the city needed to have come cafes or places to grab a drink out on the pavement to help get the streets back to life.
“We need shops, cafes, entertainment downtown.”
He also suggested sites that had been vacant for many years should be turned into proper urban parks.
Auckland CBD. (File photo) RNZ / Yiting Lin
“Not astro turf and a few benches… it doesn’t take much to actually have it properly grassed with some plants in there.”
The deputy mayor of Auckland, Desley Simpson, said the council was putting significant investment into the wider city centre, with major streetscape updgrades and a programme of events.
She said there was a strong interest in finding ways to keep long-term empty sites contributing positively to the city, and the council was exploring ideas.
Temporary uses like pocket parks, activations or small public spaces were being trialed in parts of the city centre, Simpson said.
Any formal requirements on developers would need “careful thought”, she said, but what the council was doing right now was using lower cost, small scale improvements in hotspot areas such as Fort St at the lower end of Queen St and behind the St James on Lorne St.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
