Te Ara I Whiti – The Lightpath celebrates its tenth anniversary on 3 December 2025.
Hosting 240,000 cycling trips last year and nearly 2 million over ten years, Te Ara I Whiti is appreciated as much for its uniqueness as a cycleway as for the creativity of the art that plays on its piano-like keys.
Councillor Shane Henderson, Deputy Chair of the Transport, Resilience and Infrastructure Delivery Committee, extends his congratulations.
“Te Ara I Whiti is a great example of the council seeing an infrastructure conundrum and turning it into a triumph. Bringing innovation to transport solutions like the council group did really well with this, helps us encourage many more people to give different modes a go, mixing the way they move around the city.
“The path has been so popular and so well-used over its first decade, there are plans to look at refreshing it. It’s a good problem to have,” he says.
Te Ara I Whiti starts by Upper Queen Street, crossing the motorway via a bridge and continuing on the old, disused Nelson Street motorway off-ramp. It is now at the core of an ever-expanding connected network of Auckland cycling routes.
Head of Active Modes at Auckland Transport, Tania Loveridge, says Te Ara I Whiti has become an iconic Auckland walking and cycling path with more than 240,000 cycling trips recorded on the magenta path in 2024.
“There have been thousands of images shared globally since it opened a decade ago. What fantastic foresight to transform a disused motorway off ramp into a functional walking and cycling connection, now a critical part of our city centre cycling network.
“It’s important to take a moment to acknowledge its 10th birthday – and reflect on how far we have come in developing a more connected city centre, and a more connected region, particularly for cycling. This week we also celebrate the completion of the Māngere West cycling connection, and works will begin in Hobsonville in the new year. We aim to deliver more than 15km of safe cycling infrastructure by June next year.
“Our research shows that providing safe, protected infrastructure is critical to getting more people on bikes. We continue to see year on year growth of the number of people cycling – there’s been an average of 5% growth over the last three years. There’s also great demand for activities such as adult cycle skills and access to the region’s bike hubs,” Loveridge says.
Auckland Council Head of Arts and Culture, Emily Trent, reflects on the unique ability Te Ara I Whiti has to combine function with art.
“It’s a popular cycleway and also a canvas for beautiful art. We play more than twenty different lightshows on the path every year, aligning for example with Vector Lights on the harbour bridge and Sky Tower projections.
Our creators, iion, have also collaborated with six artists over the decade, designing new pieces to add to the delight of the path experience, including the show playing on the path at the moment.
“Symphony in Space by Matthew Tucker plays on the path in recognition of the International Day of People with Disabilities on 3 December each year, a date which falls on the path’s anniversary. Matthew’s extraordinary piece combines his love of music, astronomy, and mathematics,” Trent says.
Symphony in Space was a collaboration between Matthew Tucker, Māpura Studios and iion, supported by Auckland Council Public Art in 2023. Imagining the pathway lights as a large-scale piano and then ascribing each one a constellation, Tucker created light patterns. He organised the stars from brightest to least bright and then ‘played’ them on the keys.
Symphony in Space plays on Te Ara I Whiti from 29 November to 7 December 2025 from 8pm to 6am each night. View the light patterns and hear the music on YouTube.
Looking back ten years
Auckland Council Priority Location Director for the City Centre, Simon Oddie, has a personal connection to Te Ara I Whiti as it was his first project when he started at Auckland Council.
“I was hired to help deliver this project and I’m thrilled that it’s become such a well-used and well-loved feature of our city centre. It’s a constant reminder of how transformational people-centred design can be in the heart of Tāmaki Makaurau.
“The Lightpath has also become a distinctive platform for public art and light installations, enriching the experience for thousands of people who walk and cycle through it each week.
“It shows what’s possible when strong partnerships and bold ideas align. I’d like to acknowledge Bike Auckland, who championed the concept and mobilised community support; NZTA, who commissioned the work; and GHD, Novare, and Monk Mackenzie, whose engineering and design expertise helped bring the vision to life.
“A decade on, Te Ara I Whiti continues to enliven the city centre, support sustainable travel, and demonstrate the power of great urban infrastructure to shape a vibrant, welcoming Auckland. Imagine what more it could do with further investment to make it shine more brightly?” Oddie says.
When the path opened on 3 December 2015, people clamoured to walk or cycle across this intriguing new hot-pink path. The 2015 launch invited people to enjoy ‘the interactive lights, dynamic magenta surface and Māori designs, including a 140 square metre koru pattern at the northern end.’
The project team worked with Māori artist Katz Maihi and iwi throughout the urban design stages to ensure the path had a distinctly New Zealand identity.
The path was opened by then Transport Minister Simon Bridges, Councillor Chris Darby, Bike Auckland’s Barbara Cuthbert and children from nearby Freeman’s Bay Primary School.
The project was a partnership delivered by Auckland Council, Auckland Transport and NZ Transport Agency whose representatives also attended the opening.
A city-wide celebration
A public event for Aucklanders to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the path is being planned by Bike Auckland for mid-summer 2026.
Bike Auckland Co-Chair Karen Hormann says Bike Auckland is delighted to have played a vital role in sparking, encouraging and cheerleading this transformative infrastructural innovation. She describes it as “a ribbon of joy in our cityscape.”
“The success of beautiful, iconic Te Ara I Whiti hammers home the importance of keeping on growing the cycle network, fast and well. Ten years on, it’s a moment to reflect on what’s possible, and to ask, what’s next off the rank?” says Hormann.
Usage at a glance
Te Ara I Whiti – The Lightpath is in the top ten sites for cycling in Auckland.
In 2024, 241,265 cycling trips were recorded on Te Ara I Whiti.
Cycling in Auckland has seen an average of 5% growth p.a. over the last 3 years.
AT counters collect cycling data from across the region.