Posts by Lilith __
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Sacha,
Non-transport planner Ian Athfield needs telling to pull his head in.
I couldn't agree more! When he said we shouldn't "be dictated to" by traffic engineers (as opposed to, by him!) I think my blood actually boiled.
Similarly, for his thoughts on the one-way system. Does he actually want gridlock, or what?
I'm keen to hear his thoughts about public spaces and buildings , which is his area of expertise.
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But yeah, Chch had a public-transport system second-to-none in NZ, I can't imagine why anyone would mess with it now, except to make it bigger with more services. Having a non-central exchange would be lunacy! Not that you can't have non-central ones as well (The Palms, Merivale, Eastgate, Riccarton Mall, etc., all had converging services where it was easy to switch to go in a different direction).
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Raymond A Francis,
But knowing Christchurch and the way it dealt with Ecan
Whoa! That wasn't Chch, that was central government! ECan was doing its job pretty well, I think. We all voted for the councillors democratically, they did fine, but they didn't just rubber-stamp the wishes of big business. Due process, pish, who needs it?
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to JackElder,
why the hell would you want to live somewhere that’s ten minutes drive to get to anything you’d need – shops, a library, a fish and chip shop?
I get the feeling that a lot of these places are “dormitory suburbs”: – you’re not expected to do anything there but sleep, and at the weekend mow the lawn and varnish your driveway. Every other activity you get in your car (or preferably, giant SUV) and drive to.
shops would encourage undesirable elements to loiter
Gold!
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Russell Brown,
the sprawling Auckland outer suburbs
I have a relative who's just moved to Torbay. Hitherto I'd had no reason to go futher up the North Shore than Birkenhead, and I was *staggered* at how it goes on and on and on and on! Not that it's not nice, leafy and with pretty beaches and all...but so much of it!
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I can’t afford to live in a massively over-leveraged “character” villa in a chi-chi suburb that used to be slum not that long ago
Perhaps Auckland differs from Chch in that way? Here, some of the older suburbs are costly to live in, and some (like where I am) are really cheap. Character villas for everybody who wants them! Tumbledown turrets and tangled gardens optional!
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Megan Wegan,
Thanks for the lolz, Megan and David and Sacha :-)
I hate massive subdivisions full of cookie-cutter houses and manicured lawns
I lived for a year in Parklands, which is a very tidy suburb full of frighteningly tidy houses with frighteningly tidy gardens, and the streets all look the same. If tidiness is what you want, it's for you. We used to get flyers in the letterbox from a company offering, for a fee, to varnish our driveway. I wish I'd kept one because when I tell people, they don't believe me. A lot of driveways in Parklands are coloured concrete, which, so I'm told, suffers from fading and patchiness if unvarnished.
Personally, I like the older suburbs which are full of big trees and character and variety and driveways no one even considers varnishing.
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to James Green,
I have to say I love(d) the pond in the Arts Centre's North Quadrangle, the way the water looked different depending on the light and weather conditions...the Miroir d'Eau is much grander -- amazing!
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to kevyn,
OK I'm still blushing about my sea-level gaffe and so am in no position to be criticising the assertions of others...but kevyn, do you have sources to back this up?
One of the things I like about David's original post is that he's worked out the figures and so can make a meaningful comparison between land remediation vs. resettlement, and his figures strongly favour remediation.
If the riverbanks are lower, and the riverbed higher, does anyone know by how much? And wouldn't dredging the river to remove liquefaction silt solve much of the problem?
I struggle to imagine that the cost and difficulty of relocating the entire population of whole suburbs could compare with the cost of ground repair and flood protection works, which would have the additional benefit of protecting adjacent areas.
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Southerly: That CERA Rumour, in reply to Matthew Reid,
the square is/was about 6 metres above mean sea level
OK, I stand corrected on that point, I should have checked it before posting! And obviously riverside properties are at risk of flooding, as they have always been. The lower Heathcote used to flood along Richardson Tce on a fairly regular basis, before the Woolston Cut was put in. But rises in sea level *will* threaten beachside suburbs, particularly in stormy conditions.