A group of architects, artists and designers have come up with an alternative proposal to the basin flyover, and it’s been met with community approval.
The Architectural Centre submitted its Basin Reserve proposal to Wellington City Council’s Wellington 2040 plan, and hopes that New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) pays attention.
Instead of a flyover, the plan, (pictured above) makes use of “cut and cover” tunnels, and pedestrian friendly access.
“We wanted to give the council a good vision, because we didn’t think what they had was looking far enough ahead,” says Guy Marriage, president of the Architectural Centre. “What we were trying to do is show some alternative visions to the NZTA, who are saying ‘it has to be a flyover’ – it doesn’t.”
The Architectural Centre’s idea is already being championed on Residents Association websites, and city design and planning blogs.
The “Save the Basin” website says of the idea, “Their proposals display all the innovation and lateral thinking that seems so absent from the NZ Transport Agency and their flyover-obsessed traffic engineers”.
The centre’s idea utilises and combines plans that have been proposed over the last 100 years to deal with the traffic that plagues the roundabout.
If the proposal were to be implemented, Marriage says the Basin would become a two-way, three sided road (rather than the current four sides), with fewer intersections and faster traffic.
The existing road surrounding the Basin would be lowered and covered, turning parts into a tunnel for cars, with green grass on-top for pedestrians to use.
This method is know as “cut and cover,” and Marriage says it’s significantly cheaper than traditional tunneling.
“The slope of the land lends itself very well to cut and cover,” he says. “With that method, you don’t need expensive tunneling machines. That’s what they’re using in Auckland by Victoria Park Markets already.”
The third part of the plan would see a new tunnel being built underneath the existing Mount Victoria tunnel, rather then beside it, as NZTA has suggested, to use as little land-space as possible.
And because the new road would be two-way, the plan would elimininate the uneeded road by Memorial Park and Government house, providing a park-like setting for people, particularly school children, to walk from one-side of the Basin to the other without dodging cars.
The NZTA, is quick to dismiss the idea.
“It would be a major engineering challenge to build a tunnel under the Basin Reserve – the ground conditions are very difficult and the water table is high. It would also be a expensive solution, and the necessary funding is not available,” says Rob Whight, Wellington state highways manager.
Council Spokesman Richard MacLean says the design incorporates quite a few ideas that have been discussed over the last hundred years. But one of the things that is unusual is having another tunnel under the existing one,” he says. “Consultation [over the Flyover] is starting this month, so we’d hope people like the Architectural Centre would be a part of that.”
A six-week public consultation for the Basin Reserve will start on February 22 and finish on April 2. The preferred option will be made public by mid-year.