A micro-mobility hub trial in Glen Eden explores the park-and-ride model with a twist. Instead of local people driving their cars to the micro-mobility hub, it encourages users to take part in active travel, such as scooting or biking and then taking public transport to work.
Traditional car-based park-and-ride facilities have proven extremely popular, but with success comes challenges; parking lots are consistently brimming to capacity with people vying for parking spots, causing traffic bottlenecks in the surrounding areas.
Car trips from park-and-ride stations typically cover distances under five kilometres and are unexpectedly the highest polluters. These journeys often begin with cold engines, driving at slower speeds, leading to high emissions levels for the short trip.
This trial intends to encourage people to replace these short car trips with alternate options such as a bike or scooter, offering a cleaner and more space-efficient alternative.
The six-month trial includes a station-based micro-mobility hub with e-scooters, e-bikes, and powered bike racks within a three-minute walk of the Glen Eden train station. The project will be done in collaboration with Beam, a multinational provider of shared e-scooters and e-bikes, and Big Street Bikers, which installs and maintains electric and app-driven secure bike racks, LockyDocks.
The micro-mobility station trial has been developed by researchers at the University of Auckland’s School of Architecture and Planning, with funding from the Waka Kotahi Innovation Fund.