New Year's Eve revellers to get car-free Auckland streets

Sunday, 23 December 2018

Thousands of people spilled onto Victoria Street on New Year's Eve in 2017 while it was open to traffic.

New Year's Eve revellers will have free rein on part of Auckland's Queen and Victoria streets around midnight for the first time.

Auckland Transport is closing the main CBD street between Wellesley and Wyndham streets for an hour either side of midnight as a safety measure.

The move, along with the 24-hour closure of Federal Street adjacent to Sky City is being made at the request of police, after revellers and traffic mixed dangerously in past years.

It's the second transport initiative proposed by police, following their suggestion adopted as a one-off last Friday, for public transport to be free after 4pm to cut drink driving.

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The change is being made at the request of police, after people and traffic mixed dangerously in previous years.

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The short closure was welcomed by North Shore councillor Richard Hills who has asked repeatedly for longer traffic bans in the CBD on New Year's Eve.

Last week's closure of Auckland's High Street for a Christmas event has been hailed as a sign of things to come.

'I have been asking for years for this to happen as it has become extremely dangerous to have a few cars weaving through thousands of people watching fireworks around midnight,' he said.

'I would hope that next year the streets can be officially closed all night,' Hills told Stuff.

Transport advocates Greater Auckland had called for all day closures of those streets for New Year describing previous year's scenes as dangerous and embarrassing.

'It's positive to see this idea picked up, as it fits with what the council wants to see,' said editor Matt Lowrie.

The closures are in the area near the Sky Tower which stages Auckland's New Year's fireworks display.

While this year's closures are purely a safety initiative, they fit growing calls by lobby groups and Auckland Council, to have more regular CBD street closures to enable pedestrian-friendly special events.

Council officials have been asked to develop a short term programme of events and closures that can be rolled out next year, in advance of future, permanent traffic bans in some streets.

Momentum to return city streets to people, rather than vehicles, has been building recently with the trial closures of narrow High Street for an event last week.

Auckland Transport said the Fare-Free Friday initiative from police appeared on the day to have worked well, and may be repeated.

'We've had really positive feedback on social media,' said AT's Stacey van der Putten, group manger of Metro Service Delivery, as she watched the uptake at Britomart train station on Friday.

'This is a really good learning [exercise] for us, and it would be absolutely great to do this again, but we'll have to see how things go this evening,' she told Stuff.

Auckland Transport estimated scrapping fares for buses and trains from 4pm until the end of service cost about $120,000 in lost revenue.