I never wanted to be Florence Nightingale but as the only daughter of aged immigrant parents that’s what I’ve become.
Mum has broken her ankle and Dad is reliant on a walking frame. This means like everyone else I’m almost too busy to bother about community issues, cone congestion, council budgets or public consultations.
Being misunderstood means I am often labelled anti-bike/cycleway by a small aggressive band of bike lobbyists funded by Auckland Transport (AT) known as Bike Auckland, and I’d like to put the record straight.
I love riding my e-bike quietly through the back streets of Westmere to Ponsonby, stopping often to pick grass for my rescue rabbit Oliver, and appreciating the intact heritage of my neighbourhood. It’s also great exercise for a knee injured from pivoting as I make pizzas. But I'm keenly aware that riding a bike is a dangerous occupation and we all need to learn to share the roads and consider others more.
That’s why I am religious about ringing my bell as I pass dog walkers, joggers, mother’s with prams and the elderly (like my Mum as she weaves across the paths in the park oblivious to the scooters, skate boards and bike riders whizzing up behind her).
It's the crazy cost of cycleways on main arterial routes that really concerns me. AT spent $16.8 million on Franklin Road cycleway and footpath, $30 million on Karangahape Road, and the ten year figure for new cycle infrastructure in Auckland remains at $306 million. That’s more than the budget blow out of $297 million.
Some argue cycleways will save our planet, but I don’t agree. The fact is we are in a state of crisis and we have to change everything, everywhere, all at once! That does not mean spending money on earth warming concrete, road signs and unsightly hit sticks. It means examining our daily lives and asking ourselves what can we change or do differently without expecting the council or government to blow the budget, increase debt or overly control our lives.
I’m a blue sky thinker and would like to see humans call the petroleum industry to heel and demand that the accumulated profits and investments of the last 120 years be used to mitigate the damage caused to the environment around the world.
The historic draining of wetlands across Tāmaki Makaurau to create sports fields like Coxs Bay and Seddon Fields (off Meola Road) plus the loss of St Mary’s Bay to a motorway, will cost vast sums to rectify or improve and that must come from the global purse and not the local budget. I have argued endlessly for tree protection to be re-established, for the deforestation of our city to stop.
I think we are all on the same page about the need to preserve reserves and golf courses as giant soak spaces and put an end to excessive in-fill housing in order to protect permeable areas on private and public land.
For 20 years, myself and others have pleaded with Auckland Council to stop spending $5,7870,000 per annum on spraying street weeds with glyphosate which is a known carcinogenic that silently poisons us, our children and our pets. Earlier this month I spoke at the Auckland Transport and Infrastructure Committee challenging Auckland Transport’s exorbitant fees to consultants and contractors.
I’m pretty sure we all agree that a percentage of Auckland Transport’s multibillion dollar budget could be diversified into massive investment recreating wetlands, native ngahere (forests), and street plantings. Let’s encourage each other to landscape water gardens on our properties, to grow berm gardens to cool our streets quickly, attracting bees, butterflies and insects, and for the sheer riotous beauty of it as we nurse our city back to health. (Lisa Prager)
#ponsonbynews #iloveponsonby #ponsonby #auckland #aucklandshippestrip #onlyponsonby #ponsonbyroad #Greylynn #freemansbay #westmere #ponsonby #hernebay #stmarysbay #archhill #coxsbay #westernsprings #aucklandtransport #lisaprager