This newsitem has 10 comments.

• ‘Here are the reasons I go to Queensgate – actually none are to do with the amount of money it costs to do it. By the time I’ve handed out all my spare change for school-related activities before 9am, I inevitably have none left for on-street parking. If I went to shops in several different parts of town, I’d need a whole bag of coins. There are NO places to buy childrens’ clothing in the CBD. Well, nothing affordable anyway. I can also combine the one trip to include whatever other big-box retail place (urgh!) I am inevitably needing to visit that day – I have to drive past them all anyway and they all have free parking as well. I only have one day per week free to shop – if it’s a southerly and pouring rain on that day, guess where I’d prefer to go? The distance between stores like Farmers, Briscoes and The Warehouse in the CBD precludes any sort of money-saving comparison shopping. I’m not that proud of bypassing the Wellington CBD but am at the stage when shopping needs to be done with maximum efficiency, greatest speed and least cost. The Wgton CBD is not really well set up to cater for people like me, i.e all the tens of thousands of people who only have between 9am and 3pm to achieve about 50 tasks. And I wish the spy car would come to my narrow street and blitz the stupid idiots who think it’s OK to park on the footpath ‘to keep the road clear’, thereby forcing all the children who live in my street to walk on the road to get to school and home again. Maybe I’ll ring up the council and ask them to send it. ’
• ‘I notice the NZ Herald is running a story on the diabolical driving habits of New Zealanders: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10783288 The league table at the bottom of the article for deaths per million of population makes especially interesting reading: The world’s deadliest roads (2010) 1 Greece 113 deaths* 2 Romania 111 deaths 3 United States 106 deaths 4= Bulgaria, Poland 102 deaths 5 Latvia 97 deaths 6 Croatia 96 deaths 7 Lithuania 90 deaths 8 New Zealand 87 deaths 9 Portugal 79 deaths 10 Belgium 77 deaths 18 Australia 60 deaths 30 Great Britain 31 deaths So we’re better drivers than Lithuanians, but worse than the Portugese. And before anyone says “it’s the quality of the roads, us poor drivers can’t be blamed for our bad behaviour”, I notice that the United States is also a pretty deadly place despite spending even more on roading per capita than we do. However doing up your seat belt is not compulsory in the Land of the Free, so clearly they have the same issues with driver stupidity that we do. ’
• ‘daMystery: apparently something less than a quarter of people come into the city by car with the rest on public transport or by bike or by walking, so it won’t be much of a loss when you selfish and arrogant car drivers shop someplace else. I don’t drive and I can’t think of any reason why I should have to subsidise your free parking. People like you belong in the malls! ’

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This newsitem has 10 comments.

• ‘The Mayor needs to apologise and compensate the businesses that she and her Council have destroyed. The WCC notification that would destroy my business of 18 years was a small ad in the Dom in 2008 stating- “107-08 Riddiford St -revised restrictions ” This was the notification that nine carparks been removed from this shopping centre and no left turn into Adelaide Rd. Riddiford St is a very long street. WCC seem totally incapable of engaging effectively with the public and act with impunity. I knew this choice of Mayor wasn’t for the faint hearted, but this business genocide by the Mayor and her WCC is impossible for me to digest 3 miserable years on. ’
• ‘Celia Wade-Brown comments that she “appreciates the needs of business owners along Riddiford Street”, and goes on to say that no accommodation can be made for businesses due to there being an, “unacceptable constraint for the emergency vehicles coming in and out of Wellington Hospital”. I completely agree with the Mayor that public safety should not be compromised and as she does not put forward a solution that could work for all parties, it would seem the entire situation has reached an impasse. Therefore WCC should negotiate with all businesses owners along the area of Riddiford Street concerned and provide compensation. Celia in her comments does not disagree that the businesses affected have suffered irretrievable damage from the council’s gradual removable of parking along the area in question. And without offering a solution, I think we can take it to mean the council are ready to discuss reparation with John Dunphy and others. I fail to see any other solution now that the Mayor has made this a public safety issue. ’
• ‘Madam Mayor, please, please, instead of saying why things cannot be done, please state in words of one syllable what can be done by Councillors and Council staff to provide remedies to the situation. We know that the Wellington City Council doesn’t care too much about businesses anywhere (unless involved in the hospitality industry AND located in the CBD or more accurately Courtenay Place). Those businesses in Riddiford St near the John St Corner bring a character to that part of Newtown. Without those businesses, the building which is held in such high regard by Council would be a run-down, worn out building that would be regarded as hazardous to people as well as traffic. Those businesses are in a heritage building, a building costly to maintain and are struggling as a direct result of of a decision of Council to remove parking spaces, a decision that puts cars up against the footpath, but most importantly, a decision made with the absolute minimum of consultation with the community and those now affected. It is a shame that Councillors seem oblivious to the needs of a community be it business or residential but in this case business. Councillors and Council staff are challenged right now to resolve the issue. Not make excuses. ’

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This newsitem has 10 comments.

• ‘Dear Gimbal, anyone who believes that Celia Wade-Brown is – apart from her bicycle bias – that much different from from the previous incumbent mayor is harbouring an illusion. Just look carefully on how she votes on various issues. ’
• ‘You CAN get a better deal on your parking with parkspy! ’
• ‘Fans may be walking to the actual games, but there will be thousands of them milling around the city with rental cars, campervans and the like for days on end, and when they run into a dumb gorilla or Adolphina who tickets them I can guarantee there will be some bruised and battered parking meter wardens lying around. BTW, isn’t it time for an independent review into the role of Infratil in transport in this city? By my reckoning, they control GO Wellington and City Flyer [bus], Wellington Airport [planes and monopolistic Airport Flyer] and Shell [petrol supplies]. Is the reason behind the public transport mess here the simple fact that there’s a bloddy big elephant in the room and WCC and GWC dance around it all the time? Trace the directorships and shareholdings of the entities involved with these guys and how soon before you bump into conflict of interest with councillors, bureaucrats and their families? This is a small town. ’

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This newsitem has 6 comments.

• ‘I don’t have much sympathy for people who can’t seem to park within the time limits, but there does seem to be a real lack of communication between the enforcement people and the traffic engineers. Thorndon Quay does seem to be one example, but there are plenty of them around the city. For instance, my office looks out on the upper part of Bouclott St where taxis, delivery vans, trucks and private cars all persistently park on the footpath and the broken yellow lines, sometimes for an hour or more at a time. I’ve never seen a parking enforcement officer in the area. It’s pretty obvious that the street needs a loading zone – but it also needs the parking people to do some enforcement once it’s in place. You’d think a bit of joined-up thinking at the Council would be able to fix this. From what I see from my window, if you want a free park in Wellington for half an hour or so, park a van with a logo on it on the footpath in upper Boulcott Street on the North side of the road. Leave the hazard lights going while you go off and do whatever. The chances of you having a ticket when you get back seem to be exactly zero. ’
• ‘enforcement is a completely different issue from regulation. if there’s a 50kph speed limit, i have no sympathy for someone who gets stung doing 60kph and if there’s a 90 minute parking limit, i have no sympathy for someone who gets stung parking for 100 minutes. if you argue that speed limits and parking limits should be higher or lower, then i’d be happy to entertain your arguments. on the other hand, if you get a parking fine and then complain about the parking limits, then you don’t have any sympathy from me. ’
• ‘But if a rugby game is 80 mins and a soccer match is 90 mins, why set a 90 min limit. It’s 120 mins on Lambton Quay. Any way why can’t someone be 30 mins over. I thought the point was to stop people parking for hours and hours on end. They are our streets. We are the citizens. At the moment parks are only utilised 75%. Idiots should be ticketed, not decent people going about their daily business. ’

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• ‘Bryan, sorry you didn't win the mayoralty, believe me I'm sorry - especially today as the reality of a mayor who sees no value in motorcycles sinks in. Mercer street is now a cash-cow for cars, goodbye Wellington's last motorcycle park. Staggering hypocracy from someone opposed to cars, but hardly surprising given that the cycle-mad 'green' mayor hired a 54 seat Scania bus, the largest possible, and drove around town all day with just 8 people on board. With such a light load I believe they 'only' consume around 55 litres of diesel per 100km.What can we do? Bikes are great for the environment, scooters even more so, but if you get to work and can't park, and don't even have the option of paying to park, then faced with the heavy-handedness of Parkwise your ONLY option is to ride back home and drive your CAR to work.Madness.’

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• ‘Whoever you are, I think you’ll find that many of my ideas are feasible, practical and actually address some real concerns for the SW and Wellington. ’
• ‘[...] has also been covered here. No hope of getting [...] ’

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