Consultation open
Check out our plan for the next 30-years and, if you like, give us a steer!
Below you can hear about the transport strategy and how we got here, read about the challenge, vision and goals for the plan, or read the full draft strategy, prior to telling us what you think.
Our city and district are growing and changing and will continue to do so over the coming decades. We need to make good decisions now to protect the things we value and cherish about our way of life.
The way we travel is changing too and we need to plan for transport growth that makes it safer and easier to get around, reduces carbon emissions, is sustainable, efficient, and accessible for all.
We have many challenges and some real opportunities ahead that we need to respond to. The draft strategy identifies the goals and actions we need to take to ensure we have a transport network that’s moving us all in the right direction.
What we've heard from the community so far:
Many people have different views on Council's transport priorities. It's an area where one person's 'must have' is another person's 'nice to have'. Despite this, there are areas where consensus is strong.
We conduct annual resident satisfaction surveys and have recently gathered feedback for the Long Term Plan 2024-34. Consistent themes for transport include:
- Improving road and footpath conditions: residents consistently prioritise getting the basics right
- Providing good travel choice: there is strong support for enhancing public transport and focusing housing and business development near public transport routes
- Exploring innovative solutions: recently, residents have shown support for the Council exploring lower-cost infrastructure treatments for cycleways.
However, opinions are more divided in other areas - like our Safer Speeds programme where feedback has been split between those that support lower speeds and others who see it as unnecessary and a hinderance to vehicle travel.
We will continue to seek and intergrate community views into changes to our transport network, However, given the diverse opinions on some transport matters, we may not always implement changes that everyone agrees with all the time.
The draft strategy
We've summarised the key sections of Ōtautahi Christchurch Future Transport, but you can also view the full draft strategy here.
The key strategic challenges we've identified that a future-focused plan needs to address are:
- Enabling equitable transition to a low emissions transport system
- Building more resilience into our transport network and adapting to a changing climate
- Managing growth well as our population increases and our city becomes more intensively developed
- Reducing deaths and serious injuries on the transport network
Cost pressures affect all of this. We'll need to get the balance right between maintaining our assets and making the improvements needed to manage risks and grow well.
What we've identified as the big challenges and opportunities over the next 30 years is discussed in more detail in the full draft strategy.
Our transport system is central to a more vibrant, prosperous and climate resilient district.
It shapes and connects Ōtautahi Christchurch and Te Pātaka-o-Rākaihautū Banks Peninsula and enables everyone to move around safely and easily.
Enabling the right movement in the right places is a core principle that informs all our transport goals. The Council uses the One Network Framework (ONF), a national transport planning framework, to manage the transport network.
The ONF recognises that streets and roads serve not only as routes for moving people and goods but are also spaces for living, working, and enjoying life. It categorises roads into different types such as transit corridors, rural roads, main streets, city hubs, civic spaces, and local streets – each designed for specific travel movements and community uses.
The ONF is multi-modal – encompassing freight, walking, cycling, and public transport networks. It considers how the transport network works now and how it needs to work in the future to find gaps and help guide the right investment in the right place.
The Council owns and maintains 4,544 urban and rural roads, spanning more than 2,086 kilometres. Improving the condition of our roads and footpaths is a priority for our residents, and enhancing community satisfaction in this area is a priority for the Council.
In addition to roads and footpaths, the Council manages a wide range of assets across our transport network:
The Council aims to renew 5% of the road network surface each year, ensuring 100% renewal occurs long before the 30-year horizon of this strategy. Managing our transport network assets efficiently and effectively is the backbone of the Council’s transport programme. If we do it well it will result in an accessible, resilient and safe transport network.
This will enable us to get better value from our investments in the transport network over time.
Our approach to improving how we look after what we've got:
- More effective whole-of-life management
- Cost-effective and innovative maintenance solutions
We'll measure our progress through:
- Percentage of roadway, footpaths and cycleways meeting national smoothness and condition standards
- Resident satisfaction with the condition of the transport network
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
Transport infrastructure, including roads, bridges, bus lanes, and bus shelters, play a vital role in our built environment. It provides essential and lifeline access for communities across our district. A well-planned and highly functional transport network enhances community resilience, enabling people to better cope with and adapt to adverse events and changes. Our streets and roads can also mitigate the effects of extreme weather, for instance, by slowing and diverting stormwater runoff.
As we have experienced, the damage from large earthquake events can severely impact the functioning of our critical infrastructure. We are still managing ongoing repair work from the 2010-2011 Canterbury Earthquake sequence, and completing this work remains a priority. Earthquakes and tsunamis are critical risks that we must continue to plan for.
Extreme weather events are also increasingly impacting the transport network, leading to service disruptions and unplanned spending to maintain infrastructure. Climate hazards will continue to affect the transport network’s condition and accessibility. This will require us to plan with affected rūnanga and communities for reduced service levels, such as, temporary road closures, changes to road surfaces or less usable road space in some at-risk areas over the next 30 years and beyond.
Our approach to creating a more resilient transport network:
- Building resilience into transport network assets
- Developing our transport network climate adaptation approach and plans
We'll measure our progress through:
- Percentage of maintenance budget spent responding to emergency events
- Extent and location of permeable surface in our streets
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
Improving safety for all transport users is a high priority for the Council. We want everyone to get where they are going safely, regardless of how they are travelling – every time. We also want people to feel safe while using our streets.
The Council has adopted the road safety target of a 40% reduction in deaths and serious injuries (DSIs) by 2030. Since 2012, DSIs on our network have decreased by 14%, which is encouraging, but there is still much work to do to meet our target.
To maintain this positive trend, we will focus our road safety programme on areas with the highest risk of harm and deliver infrastructure improvements that provide the most impactful safety outcomes. Strong and effective partnerships with other road safety agencies, particularly in enforcement, are also crucial to achieving our goal of reducing harm on our roads.
Our approach to how we will continue to prioritise, deliver and improve our road safety programme:
- Focusing on high-risk areas
- Implementing and maintaining safe infrastructure
- Collaborating with road safety partners
We'll measure our progress through:
- Deaths and serious injuries on our roading network
- Perceptions of safety of walking and cycling
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
Balancing different types of movement on our transport network is crucial for it to function efficiently. Journey time reliability is particularly important for economic and other priority activities, such as public transport and emergency services.
Managing congestion will become increasingly challenging over the next 30 years as our population and that of neighbouring districts grow. This will likely require more proactive demand management approaches over time.
Our approach to creating greater efficiencies on the network as we grow:
- Enabling economic and other priority activities
- Developing proactive network management approaches
We'll measure our progress through:
- Reliability of travel times for freight
- Reliability of travel times for public transport
- Vehicle-kilometres travelled by light vehicles
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
Improving the quality of alternative low-emission transport options on our transport network is one of the most important actions we can take over the next 30 years. This will help reduce transport emissions, manage congestion as we grow, and enable inclusive access for all transport users. Public and active transport networks are also city-shaping investments. Getting them right can enhance residents’ well-being and be a major selling point for the city.
Our approach to improving access to genuine transport choices for everyone:
- Significantly improving our public transport system
- Contributing to building a safer, more connected, and attractive network for walking, cycling and other micromobility
- Supporting residents and schools to try new ways of travelling
- Enabling the transition to low emission vehicles
We'll measure our progress through:
- Transport emissions
- Average household transport costs per week
- Public transport patronage
- Number of people cycling and taking scooter trips
- Commuter and school travel choices
- Residents' satisfaction with walking, cycling and public transport infrastructure
- Percentage of low-emission vehicles in the local fleet
- Accessibility of EV charging infrastructure
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
Our transport network plays an integral role in supporting and shaping our future urban form. As our urban population grows and competition for street space increases, a well-planned transport network is crucial for city development.
The urban form of Ōtautahi Christchurch comprises the central city – the heart – and local centres linked to this heart and to each other.
Over the past decade, there’s been an increasing focus on designing and building better streets and neighbourhoods for people. Notably, in the central city, we have implemented slower speeds and shared spaces, resulting in a safer, more vibrant, and attractive city centre.
We will continue this approach as our population grows to ensure we create urban environments that enhance our city’s reputation as a great place to live, work and play and to create a more climate-resilient urban form.
Previous sections of this strategy describe our approach to developing networks that support and prioritise movement on our transport network. Our approach here focuses on the role streets have in shaping our urban environment, and what we need to keep working on as we grow. This includes:
- Finishing what we've started in the central city
- Planning for growth along core public transport corridors
- Enhancing our streets and neighbourhoods as our city becomes more intensely developed
We'll measure our progress through:
- Foot traffic in the central city and key activity centres
- Proportion of new growth in residents and jobs occuring on core public transport network
- Accessibility to employment
- Tree canopy cover on our streets
- Healthy street assessment scores
Read more about this goal in the full draft strategy.
The strategy will guide investment and work programme prioritisation through the Council's annual and long-term planning processes, shaping the Council's strategic transport investment, planning and policy work programmes.
A detailed implementation plan, along with monitoring and reporting mechanisms, will be developed following the adoption of this strategy. For now, the draft strategy includes a 10-year strategic work programme overview on the types of implementation actions that may come out of each of the goals of the strategy.
Actions proposed for investigation in this plan such as mass rapid transit and pricing tools will require further public consultation in the future. Sign up to Kōrero mai (at the top-right of this page) to be notified when consultations open on issues that interest you.
