Sector : Local Authorities

The City Rail Link is a proposed 3.4 km underground passenger railway, running between the Britomart Station and the North Auckland railway lines. The link will remove the current bottleneck in the rail system at Britomart and, by providing new stations within the city centre, will open up the potential for significant increases in the use of rail in Auckland.  Flow has been assisting Auckland Transport with the planning phase of this critical project since 2012.

Flow’s transport assessments of the City Rail Link considered both the long term (beneficial) effects of the project, and the short term (adverse) effects during construction.  The long term effects included identifying the ability to dedicate more space within the Auckland City centre streets for buses, walking and cycling, for people to travel to/from and within the city centre by public transport.

The work also identified that the City Rail Link would enable some of the projects proposed by the City Centre Masterplan to be implemented.  These include turning Quay Street into a “boulevard” with less space to be dedicated to general traffic (now completed) and turning Victoria Street into a “linear park” (currently under construction).

The assessment of the short term (adverse) effects of the project during the construction phase identified that greater bus priority would be needed to allow accessibility to be maintained while works are proceeding.  We also identified where essential local access for pedestrians and vehicles needed to be retained, next to temporary construction works.

Flow presented traffic and transport evidence to various Council Hearing between 2013 and 2016, and to the Environment Court Hearings in 2015 and 2017.  We have continued to work on various matters relating to specific locations along the route, right through to 2023.