Go to a new city and you get an instant feel for the place based on what you find in the streets. Does this city care about people and place or do they just want to get to where they’re going? How creative is this place? Where have they come from and what is their history?
Walk, drive or cycle around Tauranga and you’d be hard pressed to get a sense of identity, of history and of the creative spirit of this city. Our street design is seen as a technical engineering exercise rather than one of creativity and placemaking.
How can we involve our creative thinkers, our artists and our locals at the very start of the design process – rather than creative adornments added to at the end? Creative, innovative design has the ability to uplift and enhance our way of life, making lasting contributions to our sense of place, pride and wellbeing.
Why must a walkway bridge be straight? Can it curve in a koru shape, lift pedestrians above the traffic, look out over Mauao and let kids enjoy free-wheeling down the other side with a grin on their face and the wind through their hair?
Let’s seriously start with and consider our most audacious ideas first, find all the opportunities to engage our community, find our local talent, our stories, our aspirations and work back from there with the local engineers to find solutions that fit within the constraints. Then we’ll begin to see a city that starts to excites and stimulates us and visitors. Let’s lift consciousness with big curves.
By Heidi Hughes
I write for this magazine to encourage creative people in this town to drive positive change
