Source: Radio New Zealand
Riders on the $348m Te Ara Tupua cycling and walking path between Ngauranga and Petone. RNZ / Phil Pennington
Is this the most beautiful commute in the world?
Maybe that is going too far but for the hundreds of cyclists who for the first time on Monday morning pedalled along the new Te Ara Tupua cycling and walking path between Ngauranga and Petone it might have seemed so.
The sun came up over the Hutt’s eastern hills around 7.30am as a plane was going overhead towards Lyall Bay, a ferry was making its way towards Somes Matui , the Waterloo-to-Wellington train was rattling past and the traffic was going at better-than-congealed pace along SH2 into town.
Monday commuters had only the faintest of Wellingtom southerlies to contend with. RNZ / Phil Pennington
So far, so usual.
But the other transport link, the other commute, was far from usual.
“I’ve been actually dreaming of this,” said one rider as they prepared for their inaugural trip to work off of Petone Esplanade.
He rode off into the barest of southerlies and with the sun coming up over his shoulder.
The wind test for manual bikers versus electric, particularly into a stalwart northerly on a path further out from the lea of the hill, has yet to come.
The first 100m and the cyclist had already covered about $8m or so worth of track-building. The 4.1km trail came in at a $349m price-tag Transport Minister Chris Bishop had noted on opening day he wasn’t happy with.
That, and the lack of toilets halfway to Ngauranga, or at Ngauranga, might be the only quibbles.
Bishop who lives in Days Bay can now ride from his front door to Parliament and barely touch a road.
RNZ / Mark Papalii
But until now commuter riders did not see it, focused tightly as they had been on their front wheels avoiding debris and staying well within the shoulder of the motorway.
Now they get to look up and out towards Baring Head. The logging trucks that had been on their right shoulders were now well away on the other side of Metlink’s Hutt Valley Line.
“Beautiful,” said one arriving atop the gentle slope of the bridge at the southern end the vaults the rail line. “Every day’s a happy day.”
Transport Minister Chris Bishop (3rd left) on opening day. RNZ / Mark Papalii
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
Original source: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/05/18/cyclists-commute-at-sunrise-on-the-beautiful-te-ara-tupua/