How to Achieve the Key Goals

Use and enjoyment

Improve the use, understanding, celebration and enjoyment of the river and its setting, to be freely available as a safe and welcoming place for the pleasure, relaxation and inspiration of citizens and visitors

Explanation

The Avon River/Ōtakaro corridor is an important amenity linkage which adds much to the central city experience. The significance of the corridor has been identified and developed in past planning strategies and the City Plan requires that it should continue to be improved, in order to maintain and improve the level of amenity.

Improvements should focus on the appreciation and enjoyment of the river corridor as an inner-city place of relaxation, increasing its use as a continuous pedestrian and cycling corridor with safe links to the city streets, and providing interpretation material that increases popular understanding of its cultural significance.

Making it accessible for all will promote the inclusive nature of the Council’s management of the city’s parks and waterways.

Methods

Vehicular circulation

Continue to use Oxford and Cambridge Terraces as scenic routes providing vehicle, cycling and foot access for able and disabled users to travel to and along the river corridor.

Continue to use the roads that flank and cross the corridor as an integral part of the road hierarchy of the city centre. Keep some of the roadways as parts of the inner city arterial "ring" of one-way streets, and use others for general inner-city traffic.

Keep public roadways as bounding elements of the river corridor wherever possible, within the constraints of the central city traffic management. Explore ways of increasing their recreational use, such as reduced carriageway widths, slow speed roads, one way entry and exit points, shared carriageways and the closing of intersections to create cul-de-sacs for local access only.

Provide roadside bus stops, drop-off and short term parking bays, as appropriate, to make it easier for city residents, tourists and sightseers to get to within short walking distance of their chosen destinations in the corridor.

Pedestrian and cycle circulation

Continue to provide a continuous pedestrian pathway on the Cambridge Terrace side of the river from the Antigua footbridge to the Victoria Bridge and from Colombo Street to Barbadoes Street. Discourage the use of this pathway by cyclists.

Establish and mark a continuous pathway along the Oxford Terrace side of the river from the Antigua footbridge to Barbadoes Street, located no closer to the river than the existing pathways, and incorporating the existing pathways or roadside pavements wherever possible.

Investigate including a shared pedestrian/cycle promenade suitable for use by commuter cyclists, at least 3 metres wide, alongside the existing Oxford Terrace and Lichfield Street roadways from the Antigua footbridge to the Bridge of Remembrance.

Make sure that the existing and new paths along the Oxford Terrace side of the river from Colombo Street to Barbadoes Street can be shared by pedestrians and cyclists.

Continue to provide a shared pedestrian/cycle route on the Cambridge Terrace side of the river from Barbadoes Street to Fitzgerald Avenue and consider installing or marking another on the Oxford Terrace side of the river.

Make sure that all pathways and nearby vegetation comply with the Safer Canterbury Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design guidelines co-produced by the Christchurch City Council in 2004.

Make sure that all pathways, park furniture, and signs comply with the Parks and Waterways Access Policy (2002).

Provide clear marking and signs to minimise conflicts between pedestrians and cyclists, and devices to reduce cyclists’ speed where needed for safety reasons. Consider including "theme" design elements, co-ordinated with the suite of landscape furniture described below, to establish a unity of style and to reinforce the heritage identity of the river corridor.

Provide safe pedestrian and cyclist crossing points on all city streets which cross the river corridor, and mark them clearly.

Commercial activities

Issue leases, licences and concessions for commercial activities and their associated support only where the activities are quiet, are passive in nature, do not disturb public use or enjoyment of the corridor, and can be enjoyed by the general public.

Locate areas for leases, licences and concessions for outdoor dining on paved areas separated from the river berms by formed roadways, and consider other locations only where there are extenuating circumstances leading to better public enjoyment of the corridor.

Use and enjoyment of the waterway

Open up and maintain places along the riverbanks for people to safely touch and paddle in the flowing river, including places where people can see and feed eels.

Encourage use of the river by non-motorised watercraft and restrict its use by motorised craft.

Provide and maintain gently sloping riverbank areas suitable for launching of canoes and other light craft, with associated vehicle parking bays, at places along the river selected according to river depths, hard surface areas, flow and ecological values.

Keep open views to the waterway from surrounding areas, including lawns running down to the river’s edge, to ensure good public surveillance of the waterway as well as public enjoyment of its scenic attractions.

Take care when establishing areas of dense vegetation that it frames views rather than obstructing them. (move the word that to this position in the sentence)

Viewing from vehicles

Establish viewing windows that provide river views for motorists on main routes into and through the central city where they run alongside or cross the river, and manage them to make sure that motorists’ views are framed but not obscured by landscape features or parked cars.

Provide roadside parking bays to let people park alongside the river, located so as not to create continuous barriers of parked cars between the river and the roadways, and use regulations to discourage their use for long-term commuter parking.

Commemorative theme areas

Identify a number of distinct theme areas for the grouping of commemorative trees, memorials and plaques. Establish a landscaped setting for each area, in which future trees, memorials and plaques can be placed. Write and enforce design guidelines for each area to make sure that all additions fit with the theme.

Areas with potential for this use are shown on the implementation plans (Sheets 1 to 11).

Prepare conservation guidelines that encourage the relocation of existing plaques and memorials into those areas as appropriate, and provide interpretation material to explain their history, purpose and heritage value.

Landscape furniture and lighting

Identify existing lights and furniture of heritage significance, and prepare and carry out a conservation programme that protects and celebrates their heritage value within the wider context of the heritage identity of the river corridor.

Install an appropriate suite of seating, lighting, bollards, drinking fountains, cycle stands, rubbish bins, artwork and waymarking, consistently throughout the river corridor and the commemorative theme areas, to establish a unity of style, complement the existing furniture of heritage significance, replace existing furniture deemed inappropriate, and reinforce the heritage identity of the river corridor.

Establish a programme for installation of interpretation panels, signs and feature lighting consistently throughout the river corridor and the commemorative theme areas, to guide visitors and to reveal and celebrate the river’s rich natural and cultural heritage.

Make sure that all roads, paths and assembly areas between Antigua Street and Barbadoes Street have enough night-time lighting to enable easy public surveillance. Where possible, combine security lighting with feature lighting.

Education, interpretation and promotion

Encourage public understanding, appreciation and celebration of the natural and cultural heritage features of the river and its setting, and improve way-finding along the river corridor, using a combination of signs and publications, co-ordinated to establish a consistent heritage 'trail' that is styled to match the suite of park furniture.

Use extra interpretation, plus advocacy, education and other techniques such as events and links with school groups, to further highlight and celebrate the corridor’s natural character and heritage values, including Ngāi Tahu and European cultural values, and to explain actions that people can take or avoid in order to protect these values.

See if a programme of public events can be established to celebrate and to increase people’s enjoyment, appreciation and understanding of the river and its setting. Planning must make sure that all damage caused by such events is made good.

Partnerships

Establish partnerships, as appropriate, with the community, with professional organisations and groups, and with local and national government organisations, to carry out the goals of this Masterplan.