NY's Pedestrian Plazas.

In my last post, I said that Mayor Len Brown talked about the desire to turn Queen St. into a pedestrian-only space. I personally love the idea of making it a pedestrian mall. On a survey done recently, 64% of Aucklanders wanted more pedestrian access to Queen St. with either no traffic at all or shared by pedestrians and vehicles with businesses in the area. I think it is good that people want the change. Shame on the 33% who wanted to keep it as it is. I find the footpath in Queen St. too small and in peak hours, it is terrible to walk through it because sometimes you can get sandwiched by random people. Making Queen St more pedestrian-friendly will definitely be a good thing.

For example is New York. The city is known for its horrendous traffic and in 2009, Times Square was closed off for vehicles from 42nd St. 43rd St. as an experiment and to see if the idea can work and how the public will react. There were mixed views but most people really seem to like the idea. Watch the video to see what was done to Times Square:

Maybe we can try an experiment like this for Queen St to see how people  would react to the change. I think it will attract more people, businesses on the main street will benefit and based on Times Square's example, it improves air quality in the city.

What do you think? Is this a good idea or not? Can an experiment like this be applied in Auckland?

If you want to know more about the NY's pedestrian plaza programme, click the links below:

NYC Dot
Smarter Cities
Inhabitat
Shareable Cities