Russell Frankum isn’t a statistic – he was Michael Frankum’s son.
In September 2020, 57-year-old Russell, a cyclist, was hit and killed in a crash with a van near the intersection of Christchurch’s Simeon St and Brougham St, known as the Southern Motorway, a busy state highway plied by freight trucks heading to Lyttelton’s port.
“We don’t go up there that often from Waimate,” says Michael Frankum, 87, of his South Canterbury home, a more than two-and-a-half-hour drive south of Christchurch. “What I can see of it, all the traffic comes off that motorway and into a bottleneck.”
Just over a year after Russell’s death, the New Zealand Transport Agency announced a “21st Century upgrade” for the intersection, with plans to build an overbridge to replace the existing pedestrian and cycle crossing, and associated safety upgrades, costing up to $90 million.
It was part of the previous government’s multi-billion-dollar NZ Upgrade Programme, an array of road, public transport, walking and cycling infrastructure projects, from Northland to Otago.
Work on the Christchurch overbridge was meant to start in September this year but now the project’s future is unclear.
Newsroom asked the agency, Waka Kotahi, if the project was funded, the latest cost estimate, and when work was due to start.
“The Government is currently working on a new government policy statement on land transport to confirm its priorities for investment in the transport network,” Richard Osborne, South Island manager of system design, says. “In the meantime, NZTA is continuing work on the detailed design and consenting for the Brougham Street upgrade.”
Transport Minister Simeon Brown says the draft policy statement will be released in coming weeks. “We’ll have more to say on that in due course.”
About two-thirds of Addington School pupils come from the northern side of Brougham St.
“It is currently an incredibly unsafe intersection with motorists not noticing pedestrians as they speed up as they pass through getting ready for the motorway,” tumuaki (principal) Donna Bilas says. “It is imperative there is a safer place for our community to cross.”
Bilas attended a community consultation hui about the upgrade before Christmas. “All indications were that it is going ahead.”
Michael Frankum, of Waimate, maintains a nuanced view. He’s in favour of a bridge that saves one life, like that of his precious son. But Christchurch isn’t a large city, he says, and cost will be a factor in any infrastructure decision.
Waka Kotahi’s crash statistics show that since 2000 there have been 19 crashes in the vicinity of the intersection: 10 with no injuries; six minor injuries; and two serious. Russell Frankum is the only fatality.
“The cost of putting one of those [pedestrian bridges] up for one or two fatalities in 24 years, really, you have to look at it very hard,” says Russell’s father Michael, who hails from Derbyshire, England.
He’s also aware of the politics of the upcoming decision. “There is now a new Government in power, and I don’t think they’re too worried about that [project].”
In December, Brown, the Transport Minister, told officials to stop work on policies that would provide transport alternatives to private cars.
This year, the Government has officially axed the Auckland fuel tax – leading Mayor Wayne Brown to warn the city faced a transport funding deficit of more than $1 billion.
Brown, the Transport Minister, said the new government policy statement would focus on the “basics”: “building and maintaining the roads, making public transport safe and reliable, and efficient use of taxpayers’ money”.
Back to Christchurch’s Brougham St, and Don Babe, chair of cycling advocacy group Spokes Canterbury, has his own take on the change in the political wind.
“It makes sense for the children of Addington to have safe access to their school otherwise they cannot be exposed to the mandated hour of maths and reading per day.”
Now, Addington School parents are driving circuitous routes to drop their kids off, he says, or activating the pedestrian crossing which halts traffic on the state highway. An overbridge would speed up traffic, he says.
However, cyclists and pedestrians don’t need to be separated from traffic if drivers defer to them, Babe says.
As a model for child safety, he points to Norway – where, in 2019, no children aged under 16 died in traffic crashes. In the capital city, Oslo, which aims for no traffic deaths, there have been large investments in public transport, bike lanes and pedestrian facilities, accompanied by restrictions on car use and speed limits.
Babe says: “At this point, providing separated cycleways is the only way to convince parents in New Zealand that it is safe to walk or cycle to school.”
Wigram MP and former Labour Cabinet minister Megan Woods says she’d be alarmed if the Brougham St pedestrian overbridge was scrapped by the Government.
“Our government committed to prioritising the safety of Addington residents. I call on the current government to honour that commitment.”
(Transport Minister Brown responds: “More information will be available at the conclusion of the current design and consenting phase.”)
Labour’s transport spokesperson Tangi Utikere says the former government wanted viable and better public transport and cycleway use in Christchurch, and the country’s transport system should be upgraded to be safer, greener and more efficient.
Green Party Transport spokesperson Julie Anne Genter accuses the Government of having an irresponsible, slash and burn approach to projects that reduce emissions and congestion.
“The Government has recklessly cancelled dozens of projects from the Transport Choices Programme that had already been consulted on and designed with the community. This will negatively impact children from at least 122 schools around the country.”
Genter’s fear is these changes will put the country’s emission reduction targets out of reach – “and our transport network out of date”.
Michael Frankum, of Waimate, isn’t fixated on a pedestrian overbridge for Brougham St. He wants speeding cars – either approaching or leaving the motorway, going from 60kmh to 100kmh, or vice versa – slowed down, perhaps through driver education.
What’s worked well in England, Frankum says, are radar traps – areas policed by speed cameras, with drivers warned by large signs miles earlier. But they must be enforced by substantial fines, he warns.
“No $30 here, $50 there – $500 a smack, or something like that.”
Frankum reckons the radar traps have had a “bloody wonderful effect” on drivers in England, and could do so in New Zealand.
“Most of them won’t be educated, like you and me – they put their boot down, and they’ve got to be told: slow down, mate, or you’re going to pay.”
