Media

Ready for Change? Lets Go.

With the new Maungatapu underpass to Welcome Bay opening soon, a cost effective solution is being suggested as a quick option to provide relief to peak-time motorists using Fifteenth Avenue and Turret Road, sooner rather than later.

The idea is, to create only one additional lane within the existing road-space along Fifteenth Avenue and Turret Rd. This third lane would be used to implement a two-lane “tidal-flow” system – the extra lane switches direction to provide two continuous lanes for either the morning or afternoon peak flows.

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Dramatic changes proposed for Tauranga’s transport system Bay of Plenty Times – 26 Jan
By John Cousins

A bold plan to stop Tauranga degenerating into a city plagued by congested roads and long queues of traffic has been unveiled by architect Mark Wassung.

Construction would kick off in 2020 with the replacement of Cameron Rd’s green median strip with a light rail system.

”If we don’t have a plan we will be floundering in the dark,” the architect and urban designer told the Bay of Plenty Times.

He predicted there would be a lot of naysayers but the alternative was incremental haphazard growth.

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A different view of the park

Imagine a transport hub, information centre and accommodation provider all in one location in downtown Mount Maunganui.

That’s the vision local architect Mark Wassung has for Salisbury Avenue along the edge of Coronation Park.

He’s seen the ‘chaos’ of bewildered cruise ship passengers getting off at Salisbury Wharf, where taxis and buses jostle for space, and thinks the best solution is to combine tourist facilities with accommodation and a transport centre, to bring people in and out of the Mount with ease.

Mark says the idea is all about generating conversations and shifting thinking, particularly with the Port of Tauranga, which would have to come on board for the project to be viable.

Wassung: Using rail to reduce traffic

Tauranga architect and urban design guru Mark Wassung is pleased rail usage is finally on the public agenda.

“For the last three years I have been trying to promote the usage of Existing Rail for a Suburban Passenger Train Service for Tauranga.”

He says this is has largely fallen on deaf ears with the local authorities, but has excited a lot of public comment.

“One of my Facebook postings on this has had 22,000 engagements. Unfortunately, the discussion has largely gone off on a tangent by trying to link Tauranga to Auckland via Hamilton.

He says double tracking at this early stage can be avoided by constructing small lay-bye short sidings to allow the suburban passenger train to pause, and allow the Port Freight Train Traffic to have priority all day.

Seniors and student tower block proposed for Tauranga – by John Cousins

A plan to mix seniors with university students in a $45 million high-rise development in Tauranga’s downtown has been floated by architect Mark Wassung.

He wants to give retired people the housing option of rubbing shoulders with students in a tower block built on the council-owned site in Durham St, opposite Baycourt.

”We are going to have a quadrupling of seniors over the next 20 years. Seniors don’t always want to live in retirement homes – we need to change our approach.”

The registered architect who ran for a seat on the council last year has announced his latest vision for the future, Tauranga Together. It included giving the elderly an alternative to retirement villages that clustered seniors together.

https://youtu.be/kHvax9uzbxM

ART OF THE ARCHITECT – TVNZ

Hamilton Super House or Ratcliffe River House owned by Robin & Colleen Ratcliffe was selected to be in the top 7 Architect Designed Projects in New Zealand for TVNZ’s The Art of the Architect Programme. Design Engine provided the Architect & Project Management Services over 4 years for Hamilton Super House. TVNZ’s “The Art of the Architect” Episode 2 first screened during primetime @7:30pm on Thursday 27th March 2014 in a one hour episode.

Hauora ihub opens at Waikato Hospital

A unique space that expresses manaaki and aroha opened yesterday at the heart of Waikato Hospital in ceremony that included waerea (a protective recitation), kōrero, wonderful kapahaka by pupils from Te Kopuku High, followed by kai.

The idea behind Hauora ihub is to give people coming into the hospital a really easy and welcoming place to get reliable health information and some on-the-spot health checks and advice.

Hauora ihub is on Level 1 of the Meade Clinical Centre, Waikato Hospital. It is centred on the Māori value of manaakitanga (caring, hospitality, respect) and is like a tourism iSITE, with friendly staff who provide on-the-spot service, make referrals or point people in the right direction for treatment or support. It is designed to be warm and welcoming, and it includes some stunning artwork from local Māori artists Nichola Te Kiri and Daniel Ormsby, and Lucy Gauntlett from Auckland. The architect was Mark Wassung from Design Engine who worked in collaboration with the artists.