The future of our iconic Leys Institute remains unclear at the time of writing despite the recent release of the Auckland Council Long Term Plan.
Amid the ongoing uncertainty, I want to give a shout out to the incredible team who’ve made the Little Leys Library a stellar success. The Classic Film Club, storytime sessions and activities for the younger members of our Ponsonby community are just a handful of the innovations playing out in collaboration with local businesses and clever utilisation of existing community venues across our neighbourhood.
Dedicated people are absolutely key to making magic happen. But 19 months on from being boarded up - and 17 months on from a rally in support coordinated by Friends of Leys Institute - our celebrated heritage library and community gymnasium haven’t had the chance to play Hogwarts. In my regularly scheduled check-ins with our Waitemat-a Local Board, I’ve been deeply encouraged by and worked alongside their staunch advocacy within Council’s many and varying processes to ensure life is once again breathed into this treasure chest of memories for our community: past, present and future.
Taking a cue from doing a whole lot without the infrastructure, it’s been fascinating to talk to locals and small businesses of the understandably diverse views on the future of transport around our city. For the better half of a year, I’ve been actively involved in advocacy of progress for projects like creating a more people-centred downtown Queen Street, to evolve from being a thoroughfare to a destination unto itself. Of course, these things don’t come without change, and change doesn’t come without challenge. It’s been critically important to connect with local residents and small businesses to discern their needs and adapt accordingly.
Perhaps nowhere has that been more required than with the development of the City Rail Link, which has had a disproportionate impact on businesses in Albert Street compared to those around the ‘Uptown’ Eden Terrace station, Beresford Square and Cross Street stations.
Partially, this is down to severity of exposure; intensity of works, sound and air pollution and far, far greater interruption to the flow of the street. But comparing the impacted geographies and working with businesses surrounding each of these worksites, it’s become clear there’s a few other fundamental factors: strong relationship management between the site and those businesses (requiring constant communication, flexibility and investment of resources in innovative and creative solutions), an already-developed sense of community ready and able to as-a-matter-of-course support those impacted (including locals who visit their local, and a defined sense of neighbourhood identity) and commercial landlords coming to the table, recognising long-term gains in proximity to transformational public infrastructure.
My role continues to be working closely with these businesses, collaborating across the board and holding decision makers and project leaders accountable in ensuring everybody not only survives, but thrives.
Talk of such developments and improvements – most recently and notably the opening of a native-tree lined, separated cycle-lane-adorned Karangahape Road – has started to lead some to question if, what and when something ‘big’ happens to our very own infamous stretch of Auckland city.
You may or may not know that back in 2014, the Waitemat-a Local Board endorsed a 30 year ‘Ponsonby Road Plan’, mapping out actions and goals to improve access to, and quality of, civic spaces (Ponsonby Park, anyone?) and the safety, fun, ease and quality of our journeys to get there. With the original drafting of the plan signed off seven years ago, a pandemic and thousands of fewer bikes and pedestrians on our roads and footpaths ago, I’d be fascinated to know what you think of how it makes sense in 2021. What could we do better, what would you change and how do we keep it uniquely Ponsonby?
As always, I encourage you to reach out to my office to share your thoughts on this and other local issues. (Chlöe Swarbrick)
You can always drop us a line at chloe.swarbrick@parliament.govt.nz or give us a call on 09 378 4810.
www.greens.org.nz/chloe_swarbrick
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Published 6 August 2021