Auckland’s city centre population grew by five times its target rate last year - with more than 5000 people moving into the city. At the same time, measures of jobs growth, retail sales, public transport use, crime reduction and the number of street trees are all performing strongly.
The results have been highlighted in a new set of measures charting progress in delivering the City Centre Masterplan (CCMP). These provide a simpler, more focused and more meaningful set of measures than the original 36 published in the CCMP in 2012.
The review of targets has involved teams from across the council group and stakeholders, including the Auckland City Centre Advisory Board (ACCAB). The targets have been published as a proposal put forward to the Auckland Development Committee for consideration on 11 February.
The report shows that nine of the 17 headline measures are meeting or exceeding targets; two measures are slightly below target, while the rest are awaiting further data. Of the seven supporting measures, the three where data is already available are exceeding target.
ACCAB chair Kate Healy says “The city centre is going through one of the most exciting periods of change in its history, with over $10 billion of private development anticipated in the coming years as well as transport, streetscape and other major improvements.
"We need a solid set of readily reported measures to shape the projects that are being delivered and to chart the impact of this investment.
“Where results are already available, they show the city centre is thriving, with an economy that is making an increasingly important contribution to Auckland and New Zealand as a whole.”
Analysis of the original measures found some did not adequately measure the outcomes, some data was not available at the city centre level, while others were too vague. For example the cycling target has been changed from ‘more kilometres of cycleways’, which has already been achieved, to more challenging and specific six-monthly targets on the numbers of people cycling.
The outcomes published in the CCMP have been largely unchanged. However Outcome 7 has been reworded to include an ambition ‘towards zero pedestrian deaths or serious injuries as a result of vehicle collisions’. This is referred to as ‘Vision Zero’ in some parts of the world.
The targets take into account the potential impact over the next five years of major private developments and infrastructure investment. In line with the drive to see the city centre continue to grow and thrive during this period of change, some of the targets are to maintain current levels or rates of growth for five years, to be followed by accelerated improvements later on.
The headline measures and the traffic light indicators of progress are as follows, with further detail and reasoning behind each measure published in the report itself. The report can be found on the Auckland Development Committee agenda.
