New Zealand is walking again, but our streets aren’t keeping up
This is a guest post by Tim Jones, President of Living Streets Aotearoa. By profession, Tim is a writer, editor and anthologist, and his latest book is the poetry collection Dracula in the Colonies.
New Zealanders are choosing to walk more and drive less as a way to get around, according to recent research released by the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi. In 2024, 82% of people walked for transport at least once a week, a significant increase from the 64% who did so in 2023.
This is fantastic news for our planet, for our health, and for our communities. Walking for transport offers us so much. It reduces congestion, is pollution and emissions free, and plays a key role in connection to public transport. In a world that is full of fitness memberships and miracle cures, walking offers a cheap, easy and accessible option for keeping ourselves physically and mentally healthy. Walking also connects us to our communities, allowing us to pay more attention to our surroundings and the people we pass by on the footpath.
Alongside the economic benefits from reducing congestion and increasing retail footfall, there are also economic gains from the significant health benefits associated with this active form of transport. Everyone benefits from communities and spaces that encourage walking.
However, while walking can give us so much, we are giving it very little back. The newest government proposal for the Roads of National Significance shows the package of projects may cost $40-50 billion dollars. In comparison to private vehicle travel, walking is severely underfunded. Walking is officially at the top of the sustainable transport hierarchy, but in practice it is frequently relegated to last place and regarded as politically expendable. This has been true for decades, but the 2024 Government Policy Statement on land transport restricted funding even more and made it much more difficult for walking improvements to be included as part of wider transport projects.
The lack of funding has worsened the existing situation that streets, public places, and transport policies are designed with cars in mind first, making it faster and more convenient to hop in the car as a default. Plus, recent research found that several motoring trade organisations in New Zealand lobby with tactics similar to those used by the tobacco industry to further entrench car dependence and limit the infrastructure that is built for other transport modes.
It’s difficult to make the choice to walk when there isn’t a footpath to walk on. Indeed, the average number of barriers to walking that people face has increased. What’s clear is that we need to invest more in addressing these barriers and creating places that are walkable, which must also be wheelable for people using low-speed mobility devices such as wheelchairs
Living Streets Aotearoa, the national pedestrian organisation held the recent 2025 Walking Summit to provide a much-needed space to talk about creating walkable communities and putting pedestrians first. Attendees included people from councils and central government, researchers, consultants, and community advocates, in addition to Living Streets Aotearoa members.
Summit speakers presented a number of examples of putting pedestrians first including a car-free street trial near a Wellington school, safety improvements and a new community space at an intersection in Hamilton, and advocates who fought to retain a safer speed limit in their community near Nelson.
With more people walking and widespread support for walking in New Zealand, we are ready for more change to make communities walkable. We need to keep pushing for places where pedestrians matter and walking matters. A walkable community is a liveable one, and we must invest in walkability for the health, safety, and wellbeing of our communities in Aotearoa.
If you’re interested in joining us to improve walkability in Auckland, Living Streets Auckland is a new branch of Living Streets Aotearoa that is in the process of being set up, so keep an eye out for that.
Living Streets Aotearoa is New Zealand’s pedestrian charity, working to improve conditions for pedestrians so that more people, of every description and ability, choose to walk or wheel more often and further to get to or from work or school, to do errands, for exercise or leisure or just for the sheer pleasure of it.
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Thank you Tim. As a walker .. well, 60 minutes a day to gym , dairy, bus .. and
reluctant driver I can testify to the dangers of being a pedestrian. The pavements are hazardous, street lighting is poor, scooters and bikes just miss me and my temper rises ! My friend just tripped on Ponsonby road and needed gravel removal and 7 stitches.. on this a well used footpath in an affluent suburb! Pedestrians are the least considered .. thank you Tim for your work.