FAQs

Streets Alive is a trial of changes to our streets aimed at making our town safer and more accessible for everyone, regardless of how they choose to travel.

This includes testing alterations to intersections, introducing roundabouts and courtesy crossings, as well as testing initiatives to calm traffic and alter traffic flows.

Streets Alive also includes initiatives that aim to enrich our quality of life such as street art and a play trail.

A big part of the project is encouraging community involvement and getting the community’s feedback on the trials.

We held community workshops in 2020 where six themes were forged from feedback: creative street spaces, consideration of a pedestrianised hub, easing congestion and enhancing safety, opportunities for safer road crossings, connecting spaces and wayfinding.

These themes helped to define what trials would be implemented.

The important word is `trial’.

The trials will be in place for three months to provide a true test of the ideas and give the community a feel for what things could be like. Whether the adjustments become permanent depends on community feedback and monitoring.

Community feedback is critical to the success of Streets Alive and to achieving outcomes that work for our community.

All towns evolve and this is a great opportunity for Gore to consider small adjustments that could make our town an even better place to live into the future.

The Council was fortunate to secure $900,000 funding from NZTA’s Innovative Streets programme to go toward this project, so there is minimal cost to ratepayers ($100,000). The trials are mainly aimed at making Gore’s streets safer and better for all road users, irrespective of how they get around (whether they drive, cycle, or walk.)

It includes a focus on making it safer and easier for school students to travel to and from school when they are walking and cycling.

Streets Alive is also an opportunity to introduce new features like Street Art, seating and bike racks to enhance the town’s vibrancy, and to consider an area of the CBD which could be more pedestrian focused.

It’s a chance to explore the possibilities of doing a few things a little bit differently

The magic word here is `trial’. We are testing a few ideas over three months. Over this time we’ll be gathering the community’s feedback on the changes. We want your feedback.

At the conclusion of the trials we’ll consider all of this feedback and produce an outcome that works for our community.

We encourage people to be open to these new ideas, to think about the long-term picture and how we can make small improvements to our town.

Remember while some short-term changes may be challenging for three months, they are not set in stone. You have your chance to tell us what you think.

The road closures are not something done arbitrarily or without consideration.  Consultation and feedback from the community last year highlighted an opportunity to make Broughton Street a nicer place to be, and live beside. 

Concerns raised included safety issues due to the volume and speed of vehicles, the noise nuisance caused by heavy vehicles and the lack of street appeal/amenity.  The Council has received numerous complaints about these issues over the years and has tried working with heavy transport operators in the past. 

During the Streets Alive engagement, Broughton Street was also highlighted as a key link for many pedestrians and cyclists travelling north and south, as well as a main crossing for those needing to get to town – especially school children.  

To address these local issues a number of initiatives are being trialled.  To reduce the number of heavy vehicles and passing traffic we’ve made the State Highway network and heavy traffic bypass a better option for traffic.  

To encourage vehicles to slow down, improving safety for other road users and help Broughton Street be a nice place to be and live, we’ve widened the centreline (supported with concrete planters) and provided a white edge line to remove the sense people are driving on a runway.  

In combination we’re hoping to see these measures better balance the needs of all people using the street regardless of how they travel, while also making sure those using the street don’t detract from those who live on Broughton Street. 

Through the trial process we’ll get a sense of whether we’ve struck that balance right and help to inform what future street design could look like to make sure we match community expectation of Gore being not only a great place to get around but also a nice place to live. 

Eccles Street has people who live there, work there and who visit there (hospital, schools, medical). On top of this we have people who use this route as their access on to State Highway 1 and as the desired route to the CBD. Our intent is to disperse this through traffic to reduce the load on this street and make it safer.

Other considerations specific to Eccles Street include:

• Encouraging the use of Crombie Street as it provides safer access to State Highway 1

• Reduce speeding on Eccles Street

• Encouraging traffic to use State Highway 1 rather than travelling through busy residential areas

• Improving priority to vehicles coming in and out of the hospital - especially emergency vehicles

• Better supporting those who don’t wish to or can’t travel independently by car by improving pedestrian safety

No, they are not permanent. 

The planters you see around town are temporary structures to trial where a permanent solution may be placed. They also slow traffic on some of our busier streets and protect people using the crossings. The planters will be removed at the end of the trials and solutions, such as refuge islands and bulbous kerbs, may be installed if that's the feedback we get.

This project is aimed at balancing out the roading network for all road users. 

Right now our streets may not be welcoming to pedestrians and cyclists. If we make the town safer and more accessible for everyone, no matter how they travel, we are creating a more people-friendly environment for everyone. This could encourage people to lead more active lifestyles, and have an added bonus of being better for our environment.

The Council received funding through NZTA’s Innovative Streets programme to implement Streets Alive. The Council saw an opportunity to test out ideas that could make our town’s streets safer and more accessible for everyone, regardless of how they travel, and contribute to a better quality of life. 

The project builds on strategic work the Council already has underway i.e. the Streetscape Strategy and the Longford Shared Path. 

While some initiatives on the face of it might not seem to be useful, we need to take the time to understand the reasoning behind them.

We encourage everyone to tell us what they think about the adjustments.  You can either use the online forums on this page or pick up a survey from the Council offices. We’ll also be publishing the survey in the Ensign. Drop your print survey back to the Council offices.

We will consider community feedback and data we’ve gathered to decide whether a trial initiative becomes permanent. 

Any proposals to make changes permanent will be taken to Council to approve. 

From there we will determine whether any additional Council funding is required to make a change permanent if that is the agreed course of action. 

NZTA's $900,000 investment is from its Innovative Streets fund, therefore is specifically for projects that promote safer streets and more active ways of getting around, including walking and cycling.

We haven't forgotten about footpaths or roads. Over the next three years we have budgeted to spend:

- $1.47m on footpath maintenance and replacement.

- $3.9m on road resurfacing