Well it seems as though the mainstream media has finally caught on to something that we’ve been discussing on this blog for quite a while now – whether some stations on the City Rail Link might be built at a later date. The NZ Herald reported on this yesterday:
Auckland Transport is considering building central city rail tunnels with just one underground station to start with – to the fury of council transport leader Mike Lee.
The Auckland Council transport organisation says a staged approach to developing stations along a 3.5km route for the twin tunnels from Britomart to Mt Eden is among options it is considering for “optimising” project management and finances.
One scenario would be to open the tunnel with just a station near Aotea Square in the first instance, to be followed by others below Pitt St and Symonds St as finances and patronage dictate for a project which threatens to balloon to almost $3 billion.
Effectively, the possible plan is shown below with crosses or ticks next to the stations depending on whether they’d be initially built or not:
The “whether or not to build an eastern connection between the CRL and Grafton” question also hit the Herald:
It is even unclear whether the tunnels would form a true central city loop, as land constraints mean it may initially have only a western connection with the existing network where it will emerge at Mt Eden, rather than an east-facing link as well.
Council’s transport chairman Mike Lee certainly isn’t keen on the idea of delaying two of the stations:
But Mr Lee, chairman of the council’s transport committee and an Auckland Transport board member, said opening the tunnels with just one station would be similar to building the harbour bridge with just four traffic lanes…
…”I find their reasoning impossible to understand,” he said of Auckland Transport officials considering the staged railway approach.
“A City Rail Link with one station is like a harbour bridge with four lanes or Britomart with two lines – we should learn from the false economies of the past.”
Mayor Len Brown is also not keen on the idea:
The Mayor says Auckland Transport is rightly looking at ways to optimise the CRL project in terms of transport, efficiency and cost.
“I have seen some sound work around the project for traffic and cost efficiency and I fully support that. I have also heard talk of doing one station at a time and I do not believe this is an option.”
“Seeking the most efficient options does not and will not mean accepting suboptimal, piecemeal solutions. Auckland deserves better than that. A cheap compromise for the Harbour Bridge ended up costing us much more than would otherwise have been the case and causing as many problems as it solved.
Personally, I think that we shouldn’t necessarily rush to exclude options such as delaying a couple of the stations (obviously K Road and Newton Station, not Aotea Station). Matt did a good post recently which looked in more detail into what the CRL actually costs, and K Road and Newton make up a pretty big chunk of that cost, with his calculations showing that K Road station would be likely to cost around $319.6 million and Newton station a further $315.2 million.
While both those stations are certainly important pieces of infrastructure to build in the future, and the cost of ‘future proofing’ for their eventual construction certainly won’t be nothing, we must remember that this is a project that is struggling to get support from Central Government (though it’s debatable whether the government would support if even if the cost benefit ratio was 20 and the cost was under $1 billion) and which Auckland Council itself seems to be struggling to fund – being dependent on either silly network tolling ideas or inherently unpopular congestion charging schemes to even come up with its share.
If we look at the most recent costing of the CRL project, we can see that its core cost is $1.867 billion in 2012 dollars. 
Knock another $600 million off that number and the core cost of the CRL project gets down to around $1.2-$1.3 billion. I suspect that’s a whole different ballgame in the eyes of the public, and potentially/hopefully of the government, than discussion around a $3 billion project.
That said, I would be incredibly saddened if K Road and Newton stations never happened – so whatever happens it needs to be made clear it’s a “staging” of the project, not a downgrading of cutting back of it.
1. Some observations about how railway systems work:
* The key constraint in a railway system is not so much the station ‘throats’ but the number of terminus platforms. Like Britomart, Wellington station has a two-track throat (it’s since been upgraded), but because it has nine platforms and not five, it can support a much higher volume of peak trains. Through-platform systems can, of course, support much larger numbers of passengers, because the terminus platforms are elsewhere.
* In an underground system, the major cost is not so much the tunnelling as the stations.
* A staged development would mean that the terminus platforms would not all have to be at Britomart. If the Aotea Centre underground carpark were converted into a station – I’m not quite au fait, has this been suggested? – then it would both provide better mid-city access and remove a major excuse for bringing one’s car into the central city. It would also increase the number of terminus platforms by two, which would be a significant increase in capacity. And because the hole in the ground is already there, the major cost to put a station there has already been paid.
2. So, I think that there’s actually a good case for staged development, especially once the time value of money is taken into account – the point is to design your infrastructure in such a way so as to allow for it.
Ross, agree with all that except to say that Aotea station is not planned to be under Aotea Square, but under Albert St between Victoria and Wellesley. The twice built very expensive carpark at Aotea will remain as the monument to auto-dependant thinking that it is, and will still be attracting people to drive right into the heart of town like all the other AT parking buildings. Of course as Aucklanders continue to shift to PT no doubt AT’s ‘asset managers’ will devise ways to compete with discounts etc…..
Hopefully we will see some moves to convert some of these buildings to other uses [or at the very least AT to stop undercutting the market- we subsidise parking in the CBD], but probably not the recently refurbished Aotea one. At least AT are have been slowly reducing the numbers of street side spaces in the CBD through place improvement programmes, may this continue- cheap and available parking is the pushers gateway to pointless driving and a prime generator of Junkspace.
Ross the number of terminus platforms aren’t a constraint at Britomart. The throat tunnel (and it’s flat switch) maxes out at around 20 trains an hour each way (which at a terminus is 20 trains an hour in total). With five platfoms at Britomart this is only four or five trains an hour per platform, or in other words a very leisurely turnaround time of twelve to fifteen minutes per train.
What is your source that Wellington could support a much higher volume of peak trains than Britomart(before the third track that is). My understanding is they both had much the same limit of about twenty trains an hour, give or take a few.
I’ll need to check this, obviously, before I comment further; but from what I remember from my time in Wellington, we would have struggled to handle the peak loads we did with only five platforms. I can talk to some people with more operational experience.
While I’m here, and to refresh my memory, what is the maximum train length that Britomart can handle?
Well operationally there are some gains to be had with more platforms because you can leave a few peak trains sitting at the platform and you don’t have to send them out again.
Britomart’s platforms are about 120m if I recall correctly, with the central one being a bit longer. In practice that means six car EMUs at max.
Answering that question
SA6 car with Loco is around 140 metres long give or take
Platform three is the shortest at around 174m (as it could take a seven car DMU or EMU type unit
Platforms One and Five are the longest at around 187m? approx with the extensions applied
Ben – thanx for the detail. IIRC: in Wellington, while the platforms can manage up to ten carriages, very few peak trains, if at all, are run with eight carriages. Six is pretty well standard.
Personally I think that delaying the east link at Mt Eden is much more of a Harbour Bridge-esque cutback than delaying the other stations, so long as a timetable is set for their eventual opening from the start, and in a way that would let them be brought forward of demand or a more supportive future government assists.
Remember Melbourne’s city loop only opened with one new station too.
I’m not sure if the east link could be *delayed* Andrew, rather just not built at all. That junction area is going to have some pretty tricky underground construction work that would be done by demolishing some buildings and cutting down from the surface, my guess is if they don’t build the east link off the bat it couldn’t be retrofitted at a later date… not without ludicrous expense at least.
The two southern stations on the other hand would be mined out after the main tunnel is bored anyway, so there probably isn’t much difference between doing it at the same time or five years later.
Five years is a bit long though Nick… Also I think you’ve misread Andrew, he’s arguing FOR the full link first…
I do understand he’s arguing for the full junction, but he presented “delaying” the eastern link as the inferior option. But I’m not sure if that’s even on the cards, I think the options are building the eastern link to begin with, or never having it.
I think Andrew is right about the future proofing, resilience, and pattern flexibility of the network that a fully connection offers. It isn’t that simple though, it certainly adds complexity to the connection and running patterns.
Also Peter perhaps this post should really be called: ‘To Stage or Not to Stage; that is the question.’
We really need costs on staging. But I see advantages in rolling them out across different years, not least of which is to be able to have a construction team to work on each station in succession, no doubt learning each time. As well as spreading the costs over a longer period, and ideally getting the actual line and Aotea open earlier?
In terms of complexity, I believe an east link actually reduces it.
Josh often posted operating pattern suggestions that had Onehunga (later Airport) services that would come in via Newmarket – Grafton – CRL and IIRC then out east to Manukau. That keeps Grafton with a regular service, which would be difficult to do without a complex operating pattern otherwise. One operating pattern per line keeps things legible.
Of course west line commuters wanting to go to Grafton would have to switch trains at Aotea rather than Newton initially if stations were staged and operating patterns kept simple but, anyone who has been to London or a similar city knows well-facilitated transfers are really easy.
I think the east link is simply essential for an efficient service pattern, whatever that might actually be. The reasoning for it is pretty simple:
We plan to build the CRL as the core of our rail rapid transit system. but we have one line to the west, and two lines with two branches to the southeast. Basically one quarter of the network is on the west end of the tunnel, and three-quarters is on the east. Furthermore most of the suggested expansions (especially the Airport Line) are also on the east end.
The east link allows us to connect the west end of the tunnel back to the south-east network to balance this up, so we have half the network on one side and half on the other. This is more or less perfect for operations, we can through route everything from one side to the other and run the tunnel up to full capacity without any wasted runs.
Thus each train running either way through the CRL is actually doing three things simultaneously:
1) dropping people from one side of Auckland to the central city
2) picking people up in the central city to head out to the other side, and
3) carrying people from one side to the other who are not stopping in the centre at all
The ‘two line’ solution is a very elegant answer to the service pattern question.
Without the east link we are permanently stuck with the western line on one side, and the southern line, eastern line/Manukau branch and Onehunga/airport on the other. We cant route everything through to the western line, realistically only one of the three others can do that. So then we are left with two lines that enter the CRL at Britomart, pass through the tunnel then have to terminate somewhere in the vicinity of the Mt Eden portal. But then what? They’d have to bounce straight back through the CRL again and head back south or east.
What that means is that only one pair of lines can do the above through-routed service pattern, the other two lines would have to operate a much less efficient service pattern, it would be something like this:
Enter the CBD from one side dropping people off at each station, emptying out until it reaches the turnaround point near Mt Eden. It would then terminate and empty out completely, and head back through the tunnel where it just came from. So it would be starting empty and picking up a few people heading out in the counter peak direction going out to the suburbs (obviously the direction this happens in depends on the time of day and day of week). There wouldn’t be any opportunity to make a cross town trip directly, you’d always have to transfer somewhere in the city.
So effectively, without an eastern link half the trains on the network will have to pass through the CRL then immediately run back near-empty. That’s two passes through the tunnel to do the work of a single through-routed train! Given that the CRL can only realistically support about twenty trains an hour each way, that’s actually a really serious reduction in capacity. Without an eastern link the CRL will, in practice, not even achieve double the effective train capacity of Britomart. With four lines in two through routed pairs we could run 40 trains an hour total on the suburban network. With four lines as one through routed pair and two lines that ‘bounce’ both ways through the tunnel, we could only run approximately 2/3 of that on the suburban network, or perhaps 27-30 trains an hour in total. In other words we only grow the system capacity by what can realistically be through routed to the western line, perhaps ten trains an hour at best. Everything else would be subject to the same constraints that Britomart has today, only difference is instead of bouncing at Britomart they’d bounce at the other end of the tunnel.
Only getting ten trains an hour capacity boost would be a real waste of our two billion dollar project.
Well argued. Hard to disagree. And there is a political/funding risk especially to Newton Station in delay, could well end up with the kind of voting in Council that led to the Manukau Station being built critically short of its proper location.
Nick has hit the nail on the head with the East-West Link dead on.
I’ll follow up with something I posted last night on my own blog in regards for another reason for the East-West Link (was thinking more on the redundancy line of thought)
[Quoting from my CRL PROGRAM SPARKS DEBATE post]
NO, NO, NO! When the CRL tunnel is built, the east-west link connecting the CRL to the Western Line must be built – no half-arsing with just building a west link. To build just a west link from the Western Line to the CRL line would eliminate all redundancy of the inner circuit rail system (The Inner Circuit being any rail line between Otahuhu and New Lynn (so basically the boundaries of the City Monthly Pass)). You need an East Link from the CRL to the Western Line to allow back up if the Newmarket-Britomart section of track is down (break downs or tunnel collapse/blockage at Parnell or Britomart Tunnel Entrance) and maximum running flexibility of services (such as North Shore to Aotea Station, Grafton via CRL, Newmarket, Onehunga, Airport, Puhinui, Manukau, Botany, to Glen Innes, Britomart and finally back to the North Shore). In short the East Link is just as much-needed as the West Link. Auckland Council and Auckland citizens should make it a bottom line condition with the CRL that the East-West Link IS BUILT – nothing else half-baked! VOAKL treats the East-West Link as bottom line for the CRL – more so that the K-Rd and Newton Stations being built after Aotea Station (and of course the tunnel itself). So in saying that I can understand Mike Lee’s fury there and am fully behind him (now that is rare in itself) in making sure the East-West Link is built at Mt Eden.
Of course with that super route circuit I am looking way out to 2032-2042 with several other lines built (assuming all are heavy rail) but the way things move slow around this place (NZ
) might as well incorporate the super-circuit now into the CRL
Looks like more reporting on the true costs in today’s story in the herald
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10810002
As long as Aotea Station and the east and west links at Mt Eden get built as part of Stage 1, that is fine. Its important I feel to ensure the east and west links get built at the very beginning of the project. If the K’Rd and Newton stations get built after that as ‘Stage 2′, I dont have an issue with that.
I agree there, although I can see one potential caveat. If I read the plans correctly then building the full junction with west and east links requires demolition of the existing Mt Eden station. Not a problem if we build Newton as a replacement a few hundred metres away, but if that station is staged that leaves a big hole between Kingsland and Grafton without a station. I think the obvious answer then would be to relocate Mt Eden station about 500m west to the vicinity of Dominion Rd. But if we do that then there might be less demand for Newton.
I guess what I’m trying to say is there is quite a risk that Newton station may never get built if it isn’t built to begin with. K Rd is probably going to stack up, but Newton is really about redevelopment and intensification, not meeting any major existing need. It would be all too easy to say “well there isn’t that much around Newton, and K Rd, Grafton and Mt Eden/Kinglsand stations are nearby so we just can’t justify spending a third of a billion dollars to add in this station”.
Well, if that’s the case, then both Newton and Aotea stations along with the east and west links, should be built as part of Stage 1 as Newton is going to have to replace Mt Eden station given the close proximity as described. The project’s Stage 2 would be the building of K’Rd station. That would in fact work out better as shifting Mt Eden station to Newton Station will result in greater customer patronage anyway. The Mt Eden station shelter can be re-used for another suburban station – like Te Mahia, once Te Mahia’s platform has been shifted a little further up the line to a place ‘visually’ closer to the main road to allow for a park and ride facility.
Last I looked Te Mahia was on a date with the bulldozer (yay) and a new station planned to be built down the line near the Spartan Road Rail Crossing – where the station would be more useful (including adding on a park and ride facility).
Where did you hear that?
Spartan Rd was an old concept, if I understand correctly they’re not progressing that.
I can to some extend understand your arguement, but I believe if one station ‘had’ to be missed out on in stage one (Out of either Aotea, K Rd or Newton), then it would have to be Newton. I think K rd will be far far busier than Newton would ever be. Building Newton first and thus delaying the K Rd station IMO would be crazy. I do admit tho that I would rather the Newton station not be built at all, all it would do would slow down journey times and not serve any great purpose IMO. There are other stations not too far from it either.
Newton had the biggest redevelopment potential out of all of the stations due to the large amounts of light commercial land around it.
If it is built without the extra stations, this removes our capacity problems and allows for much better service. This could then be used as an argument by those in certain political circles to say – the network works fine as is why would we spend more money to build stations we don’t need?. Currentley our biggest argument for the CRL is that the existing infrastructure simply cannot handle the expected numbers of passengers. It is a pretty watertight argument. Do we not risk finding ourselves in a position in the future where we simply cannot convince people that we do in fact need these extra stations?
I remember they were going to omit the Cutty Sark Station on the DLR Lewisham extension for similar reasons.
In hindsight that would seem totally inconceivable now.
If we do do it all at once- it will be the first time we can sit back and say
“well, that’s certainly working, aren’t we glad we did the whole thing- can you imagine what a mistake it would’ve been not to!”
This would be a nice change for Auckland rather than the usual opposite.
None of the above replies have seen the bleeding obvious. The Eastern Junction and the 2 stations cannot be built with trains running. Just think of the disruption to the system of closing the CRL whilst 2 stations are fitted out and a 2 junctions are dug and connected. And don’t tell me it can be done at night. It would take forever. Later construction and it’s shutdowns will decimate patronage.
I’m pretty sure that’s the case with the eastern link, it has to be built in the first place or not built at all.
But the two other stations could be constructed while the tunnel was in use. They did that in Melbourne just fine, no reason they couldn’t use the same technique in Auckland.
These costs assume that either the GFC suppresses construction activity globally for another 10-15 years or that the post New Zealand earthquakes rebuild wont start for 10-15 years. If neither of those demand suppressors happens then you need to factor in construction price inflation of 30%-60% depending on the speed of the rebuild. There should be similar price deflation once the rebuild has passed it’s peak, ie 5 or 10 years from now depending on when the Insurance Concil gives Cabinet the go ahead to start the rebuild. Suzanne Wilkinson at Auckland Uni can probably give you more precise numbers since she’s one of the worlds leading experts on post-disaster reconstruction economics.
Ross Clark’s comments regarding utilizing the Civic Carpark as access to the Aotea Station made me think about possibilities for Newton.
NewCall Tower which is only about 20 metres from the Symonds St/Kyber Pass intersection (Official address 44 Khyber Pass Road) has an extensive sub-level which could be re-developed to provide pedestrian access to the CRL.
Whilst on the subject, why exactly isn’t the Aotea Station up at Aotea Square?
Some inovative solutions using exisiting sub-street level infrastructure could make these stations at least functional if not as grand as original envisaged.
The improvement and extension of these stations would be far easier to get funding for once pax numbers were proven.
If $500m could be saved be creating cheaper stations initially, the project would have a better chance of funding success without losing it’s effectiveness.
Richard to simple answer to both these suggestions is that a station needs to be on the route of the line, fairly obviously, and the line will not jink about all over the place to collect various parking garages both because direct is clearly for a rail line operationally and for service. And because it will be mainly under Council owned streets to minimise property and construction costs.
“Whilst on the subject, why exactly isn’t the Aotea Station up at Aotea Square?”
A few reasons, firstly it is very close to Aotea Square and may have an entrance directly to it via an underpass. Secondly because the tunnel is being built under the road corridor to avoid impacting on buildings and privately owned land. Swinging the tunnel out from Albert-Vincent St to the square itself would be difficult and expensive. Thirdly because the ‘centroid’ of where people work, live and play in the CBD is a bit further north, centered between Wellesley and Victoria Sts. There isn’t as much south of Aotea Square, more of the action is to the north.
When at Auckland City Council I headed up some exploratory work on building a bus station on the car park behind Bledisloe, as the CRL was being first planned at the time I checked connecting the bus station to the rail and how far underground the Aotea/Civic station would be, it was pretty much at grade with Queen St.
So you probably could link the car park to the station, but why would you? The car park is such a dismal place. I imagine the real cost of the K Rd station is the length of the shaft to the highest point of the K Rd ridge, zigzag escalators would make that an enormous hole and to be honest, I can’t see K Rd generating a huge amount of traffic.
If it has to be one station at first, sobeit, but I think the full triangle is crucial.
Sadly, the Bledisloe car park site wasn’t big enough for a bus station.
The reality is simple there is little funding available at the moment. The government is being tight with public funds which is good. Now either the cost of the project is reduced or the funding available for the project from central government is likely not to be there (or Auckland can pick up more of the bill – rate rises are not fun)
So long as these two stations can be built later without major disruption to the network operations then one must be willing to leave them out of the project. In addition some future proofing would need to be done so they can branch out to the North shore with little disruption. I think Len Brown is arguing for them in the hope he can get them and as a bargening position with the Government.
Cut them from the project, because if the loop is not built then Auckland rail faces major capacity constraints after the completion of electrification.
But Brendan this is the very point. The government is not being tight with government funds in the transport sector. It is spending like a drunken sailor on new motorways with not only no evidence that they are a good investment but without even bothering to try to find out. Billions and Billions of our dollars are being spent on the whim of Steven Joyce. And his whim is based on a backwards idea of not only a time that has passed, last century, but also for a place that is no longer there, Auckland as a provincial town.
They preach austerity and practice blatant profligacy.
Now don’t get me wrong; I don’t agree that starving the patient is the best cure, but I would certainly prefer that to giving her poisonous medicine. Which is a way of saying government stimulus can be a good idea but only when the activity being stimulated is an economically positive one. Big duplicate motorways are not, encouraging more driving is not.
Not building the stations is like building a four lane harbour bridge as Mike Lee says a big mistake. Having all stations will give a much bigger economic uplift to the CBD. The costs of building initially will be alot cheaper than doing them later.
I think the competing ideas are build all at once or stage some elements, not don’t build some elements. The second was done in Melbourne. I’m not unhappy with that as long as the delayed parts are guaranteed to occur within a fairly direct timescale.
Why does it have to be called Aotea anyway? I reckon Auckland Central would be more appropriate. Would be very Similar to Melbourne Central, even tho none of them would be major terminus stations.
Melbourne Central was named after the shopping mall above it, a terrible misnomer that causes a lot of confusion. It’s neither the central station of the suburban network (that’s Flinders St), nor the central station of the regional/interstate network (that’s Southern Cross)… and it’s not actually central to the city being on the northern fringe of the CBD.
People expect the ‘central station’ to be the main terminus, at the moment that is Britomart. Aotea will only be a simple two track underground station, albeit a very busy one. If we want to give it a simple geographic moniker I would suggest “Midtown” or “Auckland City”, to pair with “Downtown” or “Auckland waterfront” for Britomart.
It’s important to understand that there can be very outcomes from what a station, a street, a park, or square is named. And that there is value in erring on the side of poetry and romance over the prosaic, but perhaps more ploddingly accurate.
Just one example. Cuba St. There is no reason for the string of successful Cuban and Latino themed eateries there other than the street name. And that name itself comes from a ship that brought some migrants, HMS Cuba, there is no direct connection with Central America at all. But it has help give an identity and a point of difference to this area.
The poetry of the London Tube names helps enormously in its image and more practically in way finding. I would argue it is easier to remember The Angel of Islington than 53 St.
So let’s listen really hard to engineers on the design and the construction of the thing but not have them run the marketting and image as well.
I like Aotea for that very reason. In the same way that we’ve managed to give an interesting (if a little obscure) name to our new precinct at Britomart, we can also give a nice name to the central core of the CBD. It currently doesn’t really have one, “civic centre” has fallen into disuse, all the other options are mere descriptives like “the middle of the CBD” or “midtown”.
I’ve liked the tube’s habit of naming stations after prominent pubs, where else would you get a metro halt called “Elephant and Castle”?!
Yes, I was for Kyber Pass instead of Grafton, much more evocative, and in fact more accurate. And one day we may some system with an actual Grafton station. Kyber Pass is wonderful; imagine coming from India or Pakistan as seeing that? I’ve heard that Indian cricket teams are always amused by the Bombay Hills….. We need more poetry not less in Auckland, and the history of the place is ripe for providing it…..
In the same vein, I’m hoping that the name ‘Tank Farm’ is retained for whatever the area north of Jellicoe Street on the Western Reclamation (yuk!) eventually morphs into.
Yeah Tank Farm is great, a bonkers image isn’t it? Still Guant St is pretty evocative too… either better than the more likely Wynyard Quarter. I would love to get myself on the naming board…..
Unfortunately Gaunt appears to be eponymous rather than descriptive: to quote Waterfront Auckland “Admiral Sir E.F.A Gaunt served in the British forces in the battle of Jutland and was the aide-de-camp to King George V. He retired in 1925 and was knighted.”
[url]http://www.waterfrontauckland.co.nz/Wynyard-Quarter/History/Whats-in-a-Name.aspx[/url]
One of my favourite evocative place names is Mudchute on the Isle of Dogs in London.
Unfortunately Gaunt appears to be eponymous rather than descriptive: to quote Waterfront Auckland “Admiral Sir E.F.A Gaunt served in the British forces in the battle of Jutland and was the aide-de-camp to King George V. He retired in 1925 and was knighted.”
http://www.waterfrontauckland.co.nz/Wynyard-Quarter/History/Whats-in-a-Name.aspx
One of my favourite evocative place names is Mudchute on the Isle of Dogs in London.
I’m all for the CRL. I don’t want to see parts of it chopped off either, and neither do I want to see any unnecessary spending.
But comparing it to what happened to the harbour bridge during last century by some doesn’t make any sought of comparison to me. Once the tracks are in, the possible amount of trains through the tunnel won’t be affected by the stalling of two stops.
One thing I have noticed though, Newton station is acutally very close to Mt Eden looking at the map. In fact it must be about 200m’s between the two. That sought of confuses me somewhat. Is Mt Eden to be removed when the CRL is built permanently? If Mt Eden is to remain after the CRL is built what is the purpose of having two stops so close together, as well as building $300m worth of station next to another stop?
The CRL will most likely dive into the ground somewhere around Potters Ave so trains from the west would miss the existing Mt Eden completely.
I think there’s a decent chance there won’t be a Mt Eden station post CRL.
In support of Ross Clark comment
A future connecting rail station like Aotea is a meeting point. Its front door needs to be Easy to find and it needs to have a front door that has good sight lines so when anyone says we will meet at Aotea It would not be a good idea to have 2 Aotea’s. It would be a good idea to have the main entrance to Aotea station at Aotea Square where large groups of people can meet and individuals can find each other across a crowd. Which does work very well where the entrance to a station has no clear front door (Utrecht Station, Melbourne Central or Brisbane CBD Bus station)
In reply to Nick R
First the Underpass to Aotea S should have the feel of being main access route to Aotea S, this does not mean there are not other secondary access routes to station platform. Second the underground rail tunnel route does not need to change, (I have not seen platform layout or access routes to it) Thirdly the centroid maybe between where people think it is and data calculates where it is.
Peter I would just have to ask why Aotea Sq should be the main entrance when it’s probably not going to be the one people use the most?
By all means we should have several entrances,including one to Aotea Sq (or Bledisloe walk at least).
Personally I think the main entrance should be at the intersection of Elliot and Darby St, such that a fully pedestrian Darby provides a direct link to Queen St. That is about the point most people will get to the station from.
Aotea will likely be a station with a lot of exits, I can see Skycity wanting one, one into the Atrium on Elliot, one under Wellesley St to that corner site or Bledisloe walk, one under Victoria St but like Nick, the main one will most likely be out to an extension of Darby St.
My be this station should be called Dardy St Station so that there is only one place in the Auckland CBD called Aotea S.
It wouldn’t be Aotea Square station, it would just be Aotea Station.
So we’d have Aotea Station next to Aotea Square in the Aotea precinct of the CBD.
Much like Britomart Station is in the Britomart precinct even though the main entrance is on Queen St.