We’ve made it through another week. Sit back and take a look through some of the stories that caught our attention this week.
This Week in Greater Auckland
This roundup, like all our work, is brought to you by the Greater Auckland crew and made possible by generous donations from our readers and fans. If you’d like to support our work, you can join our circle of supporters here, or support us on Substack.
Voting Starts in Local Elections
A quick reminder that voting has now opened for the local body elections, so check your mailbox for your ballot papers. They’ll be in a solid orange envelope, you can’t miss ’em.
All the info about how (and where) to vote is here, including how to cast a special vote if you need to, e.g. if you don’t receive your ballot papers.
Key dates to keep in mind:
post your ballot in any New Zealand Post box, before Tuesday 7 October 2025drop it in an orange vote box before 12 midday on Saturday 11 October 2025. These will be available in all council libraries, selected supermarkets, retailers and transport stations. (Note: Council says these are currently being rolled out and should be in place by the end of today).
You can also see all candidate profiles here, including their positions on key topics if they’ve chosen to provide them.
This election is a consequential one. The Mayor and the 20 Councillors around the table will make the decisions that take our city through to the end of this critical decade. And your Local Board will influence your neighbourhood’s streets and public spaces. So, it’s good to be informed and have your say.
What is it with national ticketing systems?
It seems public transport ticketing systems always end up with delays.
The $1.4 billion national ticketing solution (NTS) has been delayed by a year with a review finding NZTA’s original timings for the plan were “overly ambitious”.
The nationwide ticketing solution would – for the first time – allow New Zealanders to easily tag on to buses, trains and ferries using contactless payments across the country.
It was meant to be on public transport across the country by the end of next year, but following an independent review has been announced that deadline would be pushed back to the end of 2027.
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“NTS is a complex programme to deliver. It is replacing four different ticketing systems that support five national and additional local concessions with one standardised national system.
“The challenge has been accommodating a broad range of localised requirements into one national technical solution. NZTA has used the review’s insights to get agreement for a more manageable incremental release plan for the technical solution.”
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As part of the latest announcement NZTA said that the NTS would be rolled out to Christchurch in November.
Pratley said NTS equipment would start to be installed on buses and ferries in Christchurch later this week.
“This is exciting news for Christchurch and for the broader NTS programme. By mid-November, bus and ferry passengers in Christchurch will be able to make fare payments using credit or debit cards.”
The revised national rollout plan for the NTS would be finalised later this month.
Rod Carr on Transport, Climate Change, and culture wars
Via Stuff: former Chair of the Climate Change Commission and the Reserve Bank, Dr Rod Carr, has thoughts about transport and he’s pretty on point:
How have we allowed the humble bicycle to be weaponised? How have we created a property right in curb-side parking? How have we so mis-priced heavy freight on roads under the protective cloak of user pays? How have we socialised the costs, and privatised the gains, of privately owned and operated personal transport?
New technologies, energy economics and politics will require and enable us to rethink how we get around built up urban areas. There are significant opportunities to do things differently with better outcomes. The battery electric engine (e-bikes as well as EVs) and the Uber technology platform are widely available, and the advances in drone technology and semi autonomous vehicles are moving into widespread deployment in civilian applications. Network and interaction effects will change how we move around and how we move stuff from place to place.
Te Hā Noa/Victoria Park cycleway is so good, even The Post agrees
Also from Stuff, a 100% positive story about cycleways in Auckland (and it doesn’t say it’s sponsored content!). Will wonders never cease?
Auckland’s cycling network has shifted up a gear with the opening of a link connecting Victoria Park to Queen St with plans to expand connections to Albert Park in the coming years.
The new cycleway is part of Te Hā Noa, a green link reshaping midtown Auckland with native planting, tree-lined streets, wide footpaths, and seating.
It gives cyclists a two-way lane protected from road traffic.
Image via Our Auckland
London’s “mosh pits on wheels”!
Sticking with cycling, in London, a tube strike has seen bike usage soar, as people turn to the pick-up-and-go share-bikes to get places. The result: the already busy bike routes are even busier.
While on Tuesday morning, Transport for London registered a 33 per cent increase in Elizabeth Line passengers, and a nine per cent rise in bus usage, it’s the city’s cycle hire schemes which have witnessed a much greater strike-related jump.
There were 22,805 hires of TfL bikes as of Tuesday afternoon, up 73 per cent on the previous week. Meanwhile, Lime saw a 50 per cent jump on Tuesday morning compared to the same day last week (and a 28 per cent increase in distance travelled), and Forest recorded 20,000 downloads of its app in a single day, 10 times higher than normal, with the number of rides increasing by 400 per cent.
“This has been the first major strike since dockless bikes came in,” the London Cycling Campaign’s Simon Munk told the Financial Times(link is external) yesterday.
“Lots of people were discussing whether they could hire bikes once they arrived in Liverpool Street on the Overground, as part of the mix to replace the tube.”
According to Munk, the “availability of being able to pick up and drop a bike”, combined with the “sheer weight of infrastructure”, meant that the capital had hit a “tipping point” in adoption.
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“I mean some sections are bad enough even without a tube strike, so today was basically a mosh pit on wheels,” said one user.
The videos show cycleways absolutely teeming with people:
The Embankment cycleway (CS3) in London was purposefully built to be wider than was usual in order to future proof it.Some said it would hardly be used.Now there’s a decent case for widening it further.Induced demand is real.
— Adam Tranter (@adamtranter.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:11:25.959Z
Level crossings on the campaign trail
Back here, level crossings in South Auckland have been in the news recently, resulting in questions for candidates in West Auckland.
A level crossing that brings a West Auckland suburb to a halt every time a train comes through had residents at a local candidate meeting demanding action.
Level crossings in Takanini and Glen Innes are slated to be removed as part of Auckland Transport’s preparations for the City Rail Link but the Glen Eden level crossing, by the train station on Glenview Rd, was not included.
“We feel we’re being left behind with the population growing the way that it is in Glen Eden,” said Heather Tanguay who heads up the Glen Eden Residents Association.
She hosted 12 candidates standing in the Auckland local elections for the Waitākere Local Board and ward councillors at a meeting with the residents on Tuesday night.
As we highlighted a few weeks ago, Auckland Transport has been doing some investigations for removing level crossings on the Western Line, but this is still only in the early stages and there’s definitely no funding.
The State of Auckland’s Environment
The council has released their latest report on the State of the Environment, and it’s mixed. Also, nice to see the “green shoots” metaphor used in a context where it actually means something.
Auckland’s environment is showing green shoots of recovery, yet many of our ecosystems are still in trouble.
That’s the finding of Auckland Council’s latest State of the Environment report, providing a snapshot of the health of Tāmaki Makaurau’s air, land, freshwater and marine ecosystems.
The report produced every few years highlights encouraging progress in some areas since the last assessment in 2021, alongside persistent pressures driven by population growth, urban development and climate change.
Key improvements
Air quality remains generally good across the region, with vehicle-related pollution continuing to decline. Between 2016 and 2023, Auckland’s greenhouse gas emissions fell by around 9.5 per cent.
Indigenous forest and scrubland cover has grown by more than 5,500 hectares since 2018, now making up 27 per cent of the region.
Native plant and bird populations are increasing in some areas where pest animals have been effectively controlled, and indigenous vegetation dominates the landscape.
Coastal water quality has improved at many coastal sites and estuary mouths, and marine sediment contamination has remained stable despite urban growth.
Image via Our Auckland
Relaxing bus stations?
It’s weird that Auckland Transport seem to be treating this as something new, when the approach has been used for years in other locations around the region. As Stuff reports:
Auckland Transport (AT) is trialling the use of classical music at a bus station to help create what it calls a more “chilled-out environment”.
The trial is taking place at the Constellation Bus Station in Rosedale, with the music on for 24 hours a day at low volume.
In a statement to Stuff, an AT spokesperson said the main reason for the music was to create an “ambience”, provide “relaxation”, ease “traveller anxiety”, and create a more “chilled-out environment”.
They added that the focus was “not necessarily” an attempt to deter antisocial behaviour at the station, but they hoped that would become a side effect of playing the music.
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“We just wanted to change the atmosphere as people walk into the building and give it a different vibe. People could feel on edge, but with the music in the background it seems to take that edge off and be a welcoming space again,” a spokesperson said.
At the time, the council said figures showed a drop in anti-social behaviour over the first two months of the trial, but there was not enough data to show a trend.
Aotearoa’s most scenic urban bus route?
The Spinoff asks if Dunedin’s 18 bus is the most scenic in the country:
Earlier this year, my esteemed colleague Joel MacManus took a bus trip through the nation’s capital and bravely declared it to be Wellington’s most scenic commute. It’s hard to argue with a trip that features both a Beehive and a Zephyrometer, but it also got us thinking: what other New Zealand cities have picturesque bus rides, and what might be the most scenic public transport route in the entire country?
Ladies and gentlemen, I present my nomination: Dunedin’s number 18 bus.
The number 18 is a service run by Otago Regional Council, and is arguably the most beautiful public bus trip you’ll take anywhere in Aotearoa. It begins in Dunedin’s city centre, travels through South Dunedin and along the picturesque Otago Peninsula to the village of Portobello, approximately 18km away. It’s a charming trip that winds along the bays and coves of Otago Harbour, offering up stunning views across the sea to places like St Leonards and Port Chalmers.
But twice a day, the number 18 offers an even more spectacularly scenic ride. On its 8.38am and 2.38pm journeys, the bus leaves Dunedin and instead of ending at Portobello, continues a further 11kms north-east to Harington Point. This transforms the traditional number 18 journey into a jaunty 29km trip that gets you right among the trees, the cows, the carrots and the beaches. You’ll witness breathtaking vistas and wildlife aplenty, and if you’re anything like me, you’ll be quickly won over by groundbreaking concepts like “fresh air”, “nature” and “actually leaving the house”.
A one-way journey from the city bus hub to Harington Point takes one hour and one minute, and I reckon it’s the best $2.00 ($3.00 without a Bee Card) you can spend in Ōtepoti Dunedin.
Image via The Spinoff
Te Huia is very satisfying!
Te Huia recently reported on its annual customer satisfaction survey, and the numbers are pretty definitive! See the screenshot below (via social media, we couldn’t find an official media release). Passenger satisfaction with the Hamilton-Auckland intercity train is way up there, at 98%.
Over a third of of respondents (35%) travel at least once per week, and almost two thirds (61%) use the train at least monthly.
Also intriguing: while 59% of passengers are Hamiltonians, fully 21% are Aucklanders, despite the slightly awkward timetable for southbound trips. And the remaining 20% are from somewhere else – tourists, perhaps?
Learning from each other
It’s great when towns and cities across New Zealand are able to get past the noise and create brilliant urban spaces. Even better when other towns and cities realise they can do that too. In this case, Hamilton is being urged to consider Dunedin’s George St as a model for a remake of Victoria St.
At Tuesday’s economic development committee meeting, the $110.3m redevelopment of Dunedin’s George Street became the focus of discussion, with business leaders pointing to it as a model for what Victoria Street could be.
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“I was in Dunedin on the weekend and I looked at what council have done on George Street down there, and they’ve done an amazing job,” said Neale.
“I think we should all be looking at that as an example.”
George St in Dunedin: Photo by Jessica de Heij from this great post
Southbound lanes to close for Saturday’s march over the bridge
Updated Friday 5.20pm: the March for Humanity is no longer crossing the bridge.As per this update from the organisers, the change of route is due to the forecast for high winds. The march will now start in Aotea Square at 9.30am, and move through the city centre before ending in Victoria Park.
[We’re leaving the text below for the record, but see above re new route].
It seems NZTA has designated the southbound / cityside lanes on the Harbour Bridge for tomorrow’s March for Humanity, which sets off from Onepoto Domain at 9.30am and heads to Victoria Park.
That means the southbound lanes will be closed to traffic (affecting southbound buses as well) for a significant chunk of Saturday morning. NZTA says Esmonde Rd and Fanshawe St access will be closed from 9am.
It also means for anyone planning to take part, there’s no easy way to join the march from the city side, unless you plan on driving or catching the bus (or trip-chaining with ferry and bike). And it’s a contrast to last year’s hīkoi which used the northbound lanes.
These large-scale events are always an interesting demonstration of the accessibility and resilience of our transport system – and tomorrow will be no exception.
That’s us for the week – watch out for today’s big winds out there, and have a great weekend.
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