STATION TRAFFIC

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 138, 12 June 1936, Page 10

STATION TRAFFIC

AMENDED LAY-OUT

ENGINEERS' PROPOSALS

FOR GREATER SAFETY

The City Council last night approved of a plan proposed by the City Engineer's Department for a considerable simplification of the traffic lay-out, vehicular, pedestrian, and tramway, about the new railway station, and will formally recommend this plan to the General Manager of Railways for his approval. The matter has been the subject of discussion by the officers of City Engineer's, Tramways, and Railway Departments for some weeks, and in its suggested form the traffic plan is very different from that first put forward. . Its 1 main features are these:— Main tram traffic will not pass in. front of the station platform building Cas originally proposed), but "will run through Featherston Street, with a sweep into Lambton Quay—or from the Quay into Featherston Street—by new tracks passing behind the Government Printing Office. There will be a double track and loop in Bunny Street itself, i.e., running along the station frontage almost to Waterloo Quay, but this will not be a main tramway track, and for the time being will be a standby or loading track only; later it may be connected up with the tracks in Customhouse Quay to form a loop.

The brick kerbed central feature of the road space in front of the station is to be removed, and it is along this line that the tram track mentioned above will be laid.

Between this track and the station building a simple system of motor ways will be laid out in such a way that all wheeled traffic will move in a clockwise direction, whether approaching the station from Featherston Street or Waterloo Quay, and so that pedestrians who leave the station by the main entrance will cross a minimum of traffic lines. The arrangement will reduce the number of crossings of tram tracks by motor traffic to a minimum. TWO-WAY IN LAMBTON QUAY. The length of Lambton Quay in front of the. Hotel Cecil, at present a oneway street, will be thrown open to twoway traffic and so will relieve Featherston Street of a considerable volume of motor traffic. , This last consideration is of very real importance, for as the exit from the suburban railway platforms will be to Featherston Street, at a point about half-way along the western frontage of the building, and both Hutt and Manawatu line traffic will be concentrated at this point, it is very necessary that traffic congestion in Featherston Street should be reduced as far as possible. The construction of the Thorndon ramp, which at long last does seem to be a certainty, will further relieve the congestion about Lambton Quay and Featherston Street, for motorists who have no business in the northern parts of the city need not run through Thorndon Quay and past the station at all. A traffic control point near the suburban exit from the station will be necessary, but it will be a far more simple control than would be necessary without the Thorndon ramp and the opening of the Hotel Cecil length of Lambton Quay to two-way motor traffic. SWING TO LAMBTON QUAY. From the tramway point of view the linking up of Featherston Street and Lambton Quay will have decided operating advantages and will place the • station upon the main tramway ■system in straight-ahead running, without. loop work or shunting about the Lambton area. New track work to* be laid through Stout Street will give added flexibility in operation, for cars which have run north along Lambton Quay and round behind the Printing Office into Featherston Street may be sent away on their outward runs by Whitmore Street and Jervois Quay, or may be returned to the outward track in Lambton Quay to Stout. Street. I'he rearrangement of tracks will make possible several desired amendments in running plans, for instance, in the taking of NO. 7 cars on past the Post Office (and this, though a decision has not been announced, will probably make it possible to open the Post Office length of Customhouse Quay to two-way vehicular traffic, to the further simplification of traffic lines in this area and about the wharf gates). . EASIER FOR WALKERS. The pedestrian will, if the engineers' proposals are adopted, walk a less troublesome' path to and from the station: Under the first proposals he .would have, had to cross two main tramway lines, running at their busiest when he was Eit his walkingest, a third less busy tramway track arid three heavy 'motor traffic lines, in getting from the suburban exit across Bunny Street. The proposals now recommended reduce these to one combined tramway and traffic crossing, with, furthermore, no main tramway runnings in Bunny Street.

Several alternatives as to safeguarding rail passengers when boarding trams outside the station exit in Feathcrston Street were considered, including a special loop which would run in to the kerb, so that passengers could step from the footpath to the cars, but it was considered that the disadvantages would outweigh the advantages, and the proposal is now that longish safety zones should be constructed on either side of the tracks in Featherston Street. With the reduction in the volume of motor traffic which will be brought about by the opening of Lambton Quay to twoway traffic and the opening of the waterfront road by the Thorndon ramp this arrangement should be a marked improvement upon the present delays during morning and afternoon rush hours at Lambton.