Bruce St plan on hold

Complaints about parking plagued council after it announced a developed design phase for Bruce St. PHOTO/FILE

Council’s first priority is Park St

Parking not driving CBD revamp

Masterton District Council is doing more work on its plan to revamp Bruce St after complaints led by New World owner Clive Webber, with attention now turning to a rejuvenation of Park St.

A council meeting on Wednesday agreed to continue work on Bruce St and keep it at the developed design phase, while Park St, and lower Queen St, defined as between the intersections with Jackson and Bannister streets, move to the detailed design phase.

Park St will be the first done when things move to a build phase.

“This doesn’t mean we are forgetting about Bruce St,” Jonathan Hooker, chairman of the Town Centre Reference Group and a Masterton district councillor, said.

“We have always been aware there is more work that needs to be done on Bruce St, especially around parking, and that work needs to happen before we move on to the final stage of design.”

Councillor Gary Caffell said people would be able to see that the council was listening to people and not just running riot.

Mayor Lyn Patterson suggested a recommendation be added that councillors agree to the development of a master plan for parking for the town centre and it was carried.

There was a discussion in the meeting about parking in many parts of the CBD and Patterson said, “we get the parking issues, we understand it”.

An analysis of parking in the town centre by traffic engineer Harriet Fraser was presented to the meeting.

Still, Caffell said the council had to be careful “we don’t build the whole thing around parking”.

He said the project was about beautifying the town centre in a way that would last for many years.

Patterson said people had to realise the CBD was going to look very different.

“Wait until we do the design for the trees,” she said.

Plans have included increasing public space and greenery alongside environmentally-friendly stormwater management.

The design process has been under way since the start of 2019, with continual changes made in collaboration with business operators and building owners.

Moving on to the next phase of design for lower Queen St will also pave the way for rejuvenation of the rest of the street, including reducing the time and cost to develop designs for additional blocks.

The Town Centre Revamp project is working to implement objectives that council adopted in its Town Centre Strategy in 2018.

The strategy and all the up-to-date designs for Park, Bruce and lower Queen Street are available at www.mastertontown.nz