New Road Layout on Featherston Street

We’re testing a new road layout on Featherston Street as part of our detailed design process for the cycleway and wider safety improvements.  

We’ll be testing a few key elements, which we’ll monitor over the next couple of weeks to see how they perform before construction takes place early next year.  

The project is being funded by Waka Kotahi - NZ Transport Agency under its Streets for People and Transport Choices programmes, which aims is to create more travel options for everyone across the country.   

We’ve been working alongside the community over the past 9 months to ensure the new street design aligns with everyone’s needs. This has included several public feedback periods, co-design workshops, and hundreds of conversations with businesses and other street users. Your valuable feedback has played a crucial role in shaping the future of your street. Now, we are moving to the next stage of the project, which includes testing some specific design elements to monitor their impact and performance before we proceed with construction in early-2024.  

The two key elements we will be monitoring are: 

· Keep clear boxes:  

We will be implementing a ‘keep clear’ space in front of the entrances to McDonald’s, Mitre 10 and Ngata Street. These include yellow markings on the road to stop drivers who are queuing at the Rangitikei lights from blocking people trying to enter and exit those entranceways. A similar arrangement can be seen outside St Mary’s School and Te Papaioea Birthing Centre on Ruahine Street. These will be implemented tonight.

· Merging two lanes at traffic lights:  

We'll be testing different phasing options at the Rangitikei/Featherston Street traffic lights to ensure that, when the lanes change early next year, everyone will be able to continue to move through the intersection as efficiently as possible. This will start next week on Tuesday 22 August, and we’ll be looking at different phasing options throughout the week. The road will return to normal the following week (by Monday 28 August).

The main change next week will be using traffic management to merge two lanes (left and straight lane), which is currently part of the final design following public support for a protected cycleway through each set of traffic lights on Featherston Street. The right-turn lane at the lights will remain.

The tests at the traffic lights will last one week, while the keep clear boxes may remain in place if feedback from surrounding businesses, schools and the community is positive.

These features have been developed based on community feedback and we encourage everyone to follow the new layout during the testing period, so we can monitor the impact and make any necessary adjustments to the final design. You will have the opportunity to provide feedback on these changes and the new road layout later next week via an online survey on our project webpage.

We’re still working on the detailed design over the next few weeks.

We are planning to pop into key businesses in late-August and early September to explain the design and any changes near their property – if you’d like to arrange a specific time with us, flick us an email at cycleways@pncc.govt.nz. If you can’t meet with us, let us know and we can email you the updated design along your area of interest. The final design will also be uploaded to our website from October. Construction is expected to start in January.

We’re also proceeding with the placemaking element of the project, and we have a group of stakeholders who have volunteered to be part of a group to help us see through these initiatives. The group will meet for a workshop at the Palmerston North Boys High School library on Wednesday 23 August, from 5-7pm. Placemaking is about using creativity to provide a sense of identity and belonging on the street – it includes things like paint and planting.

For more information, visit our webpage www.pncc.govt.nz/featherston.

Thanks for taking an interest in this project.