Thinking, talking and writing towns: great reads

Have you noticed the blossoming in the blogosphere around transport and landuse? There are more sensible and, yes, geeky people writing thoughtful and tasty food for our thought. Here’s a sample of our current favourites…

TraNZport
This fresh new blog – just a few months old – is already offering lots of good food for thought. We really like their recent post “What happens when you build more roads?” and this sharp-eyed callout of misusing growth stats in a Kiwibuild article. Also check out their mass transport insights.

NZ Needs an Urbanisation Project
By Brendon Harre and rich with thoughtful insights about transport and landuse in Kiwi towns and cities. Endless treasure trove of great reads here for anyone interested in what we should and shouldn’t do in our towns, why, and – excellently – how.

(For Christchurch-specific goodness, check out Making Christchurch, maintained by Te Putahi, GapFiller and Free Range Press. Drool!)h

Eye of the Fish
This excellent blog has been running for over a decade, which is a huge achievement for something that’s clearly a labour of love by one or at most two people. Also they’ve managed to remain anonymous for that time (amazing, in that small town). Architecture-centred but also with pithy commentary on transport and urban form (and occasionally guest posting here!)

Island Bay Cycleway
We like this one for the very careful, thorough analysis of what are actually common issues experienced everywhere there are initiatives to make streets more people-focussed and less car-focussed.
What’s transpired in this notoriously fraught space is still going on, and is far more interesting than “it’s all stuffed” or “council messed up” statements would have you think. And in an age of communities being digital vs physical vs geographic vs topic-of-interest, this blog’s one to watch.

Talking Transport Christchurch
Some great brains here are thinking and discussing about their city and how people use space, in ways we can really apply in Welly too. And, bonus, articulating it with gems like “Christchurch’s Future Is A Fat Banana“. Also good on Twitter.

  • Image credits:
  • Old-school writing – Pexel.com
  • New-school writing – by PoisonLips on Tenor

What are some of your favourite urban and transport reads ATM? Tip us off in the comments…

One comment on “Thinking, talking and writing towns: great reads”

  • Jos Coolen says:

    Streetsblog.org
    Focused on the major US cities but often dealing with similar issues as us in NZ. Interesting reads!

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