Streets For People
In August 2022, Nelson City Council was awarded funding from Waka Kotahi for a Streets for People Project in the Nelson South area. I’ve had the pleasure of working with the project team to manage Community Engagement strategy and activity.
The Streets for People project focuses on making it safer and easier for people to use active modes of transport by connecting safe streets in an area. It also aims to improve the liveability of streets for residents. The projects goals include:
A reduction in vehicle speeds
A reduction in the volume of cars using these streets
Cleaner air from reduced transport emissions
A safer network for people using active modes of travel - walking, cycling etc.
A more ‘people-focused’ neighbourhood.
Key stakeholders in this project include the residents, Nelson Hospital - Te Whatu Ora, several schools and colleges and their students, Emergency Services and Active Transport advocates.
Stakeholder mapping
Engagement strategy
Shaping engagement and communications collateral
Planning and facilitating Stakeholder workshops and events
Facilitating one on one stakeholder conversations
Reporting
Significant time was dedicated to defining what success looked like for each stakeholder group, in relation to the project’s goals, prior to any streetscape design work being undertaken. The purpose for this was to not only help shape the design outcomes that we would trial, but to also build trust and confidence that this project was a genuine co-design process.
Having a diverse range of stakeholders inevitably resulted in very different ideas of what success would look like - ranging from retaining parking for hospital staff and visitors to improving safety for students using active transport to get to and from school. Unsafe driving behaviour, with some cars travelling in excess of 100kmh in a 50kmh zone, was also identified by residents as a key issue they wanted to combat.
Using a range of engagement techniques we were able to create a trial plan that provided ‘wins’ for all stakeholders, and where compromises were required they were understood within the context of the project’s goals and supported as part of the trial process.
Examples of activity undertaken include:
Two Saturday morning street events where residents came together to discuss their ideas and concerns with project staff and elected officials
Facilitating a term 3 ‘Transport Planning’ module for Nelson College students where we introduced them to transport planning and used that knowledge to help shape outcomes for this specific project (seven weeks of activity plus final presentations)
Eight project updates/letter drops delivered to each household to ensure they were kept up-to-date with the process and felt valued
Street signs at key locations to communicate the changes that were taking place and why
Survey of active transport users and hospital staff to better understand where the opportunities to improve the safety of the network were
Workshops with key stakeholders to work through the concept designs and refine
A well managed online project page including feedback form
As of May 2024 the trial changes have been installed and monitoring is underway. Initial feedback has been very positive. Ongoing engagement activity is planned to ensure we respond to any concerns or possible improvements in a timely fashion.
The trial is set to continue until mid 2025.
