Article: Street closures and delivery van ban all part of CBD vision

[ozbob]

From the Herald Sun click here!

Street closures and delivery van ban all part of CBD vision

Street closures and delivery van ban all part of CBD vision

    Hamish Heard
    From: Sunday Herald Sun
    May 15, 2011 12:00AM

MELBOURNE'S CBD would go back to the future under a plan to encourage more foot and bike traffic and shop deliveries using hand-held carts instead of vans.

The Melbourne City Council draft transport strategy also floats the idea of closing some streets during weekends and lunchtime to let pedestrians move more freely through the city.

Councillors voted last week to put the strategy out for public comment, including proposals to:

RESHAPE the streetscape with a network of "pedestrian-friendly, high-mobility" streets. This would include bigger footpaths, changes to street furniture and reduced waiting times at signals;

PHASE out the use of vans to make deliveries to retailers in favour of hand-operated carts;

BOOST bike use by dropping CBD speed limits, introducing more bike parks, developing new bike lanes to separate cyclists from cars and changing traffic signals to give cyclists priority;

EXPAND the current bike-share scheme and developing strategies to increase its use;

INTRODUCE a "complete arterial bicycle network";

CONNECT Melbourne Bike Share to the myki ticketing system;

MAKE public transport more bike-friendly to allow cyclists to enter the CBD by train or tram, and;

HELP car-share companies expand by introducing 300 carparks designated for car-share customers.

[#Metro]

RESHAPE the streetscape with a network of "pedestrian-friendly, high-mobility" streets. This would include bigger footpaths, changes to street furniture and reduced waiting times at signals;

Sounds good.

PHASE out the use of vans to make deliveries to retailers in favour of hand-operated carts;

Riiight.... I think the restaurants are going to go nuts over this one. Sounds crazy and timewasting.

BOOST bike use by dropping CBD speed limits, introducing more bike parks, developing new bike lanes to separate cyclists from cars and changing traffic signals to give cyclists priority;

Sounds good, but in practice will probably be a mix. You can't make public transport, cyclists and pedestrians all #1 at the same time. We saw this with Brizcommuter's japan train video- train got priority over pedestrians, bicycles and cars.

EXPAND the current bike-share scheme and developing strategies to increase its use;

But does it actually work?

INTRODUCE a "complete arterial bicycle network";

Sounds good

CONNECT Melbourne Bike Share to the myki ticketing system;

TransLink and Brisbane City Council take note!!

MAKE public transport more bike-friendly to allow cyclists to enter the CBD by train or tram, and;

Why can't they just ride in? A handful of spaces can be made available but it will never be a huge number as
space is limiting.

HELP car-share companies expand by introducing 300 carparks designated for car-share customers.

Sounds ok...

[Zoiks]

Im pretty sure there is a clause in the citycycle scheme that prohibits integration with the go card.

[#Metro]

That is really disappointing. If this is true, the question is then "why did they do this?".  Did they see public transport as a competitive mode?