Public spaces, public amenities: Revitalizing the public life of Wellesley Street East

Abstract

Public space and public amenities are fundamental for people’s social and cultural well-being in cities. Some central parts of cities are not providing adequate networks of public spaces, public amenities and green areas. Some core streets have limited urban life, because they are designed for heavy vehicular usage and have closed and inactive frontages. Public infrastructure and amenities in some areas are islanded from each other and consequently they are not convenient for public everyday practices of citizens and are not easy to identify and find for visitors. The lack of continuity of green infrastructure is common in many modern cities, where large amounts of public space are not workable since they are inappropriately occupied by activities such as car parking. In Auckland, the junction of Wellesley Street East and Mayoral Drive is an area that represent the inappropriateness of public space well; it has been chosen as the study area of this thesis. To improve its systems of public space and social and green infrastructures, three main goals were set: 1) improving pedestrian circulation of Wellesley Street East, enhancing the connectivity of the network; 2) expanding the local system of cultural infrastructures, integrating the existing four major regional nodes (Central Auckland Library, Art Gallery, the University of Auckland and Auckland University of Technology) with a set of missing amenities anchored by one multifunctional performing arts theatre, a museum of local heritage, and culinary school café ; and 3) extending and reconnecting the three main elements of the local green network (Albert Park, AUT Reserve and the future Mayoral Drive Linear Park) ... Overall, this thesis shows how it is possible to improve public space through design, recombining and integrating public amenities and green areas. This not only enhances everyday life of citizens and visitors, but also makes people feel at home in the area and give a sense of local identity and belonging. Such an improvement contributes to the goal of making Auckland “the most liveable city”, where streets give priority to people; public amenities are easily accessible and identifiable; green space supports the sustainable development of integrated urban ecosystems.