Cycling’s Brave New World (in #CitiesSkylines2)

Bikes are here, and it is time to put them to work!

A brave new world has come to Manukau Ranges, and all my future cities in Cities Skylines 2.

That brave new world being all things cycling (and even scooters), and it is time to put them to work! But it will be no easy task, not for a city as large as Manukau Ranges, which pound for pound would be the same size as real life Auckland, complete with a similar urban geography of urban islands, and Metropolitan Centres connected together by the transport network!

But retrofitting the city with a cycle network will be done just as it is done with real cities around the world including (also where I draw on for inspiration) my home of Auckland itself! But where to start?

Manukau City Centre (above the highway). Manukau Way (bottom left) and Manukau Riverside (bottom right)

Manukau City Centre would be a good first start as not only is it the most dense area in terms of residential and working population, but also the densest in terms of transport connections (road and rail), next to the main university (in Manukau Way), and has two major suburbs directly next door! From there I can expand the network out to the rest of the City stage by stage.

One thing I want to test though is with bikes and Cities Skylines 2 that I had with Cities Skylines 1 is multi-modal travel. That is cims use bikes for the first-and last-mile-gap of their journey, with the main journey done by transit. This happens in the real world, and given I can see bike parking with some metro stations, and with bus stop shelters I am wondering if I can get first-and last-mile-gap travel working. That said given most congestion is also localised, having bike parking for single ride trips will complement the first-and last-mile-gap networks as well.

Bike parking next to a bus stop and metro station in the Wiri industrial complex

Wiri would be a good test bed for first-and last-mile-gap integrated multi modal travel, while the City Centre would be for single seat rides (just using bikes) before a full city-wide roll out happend!

Bikes being used for first and last mile gap transport, with the monorail forming the backbone of the main journey

I have laid out some basic bike lanes on Manukau Mall (the main transit mall inside Manukau City Centre) and some supporting infrastructure including bike stands, bike parking (underground) and a bus stop with some bike stands (to test the multi-modal system) to get things going. I will cover how this goes and the first expansion of the cycling network in 8.X of the Manukau Series.

Our first brave cyclist in a brave new world for Manukau Ranges. Also seen are the first cycle lanes, and bike shelters.

Meanwhile, in parallel I will be using my latest city, Marsden Point as a test bed for cycling planning, development, and post implementation reviews to carry over in Manukau Ranges. Marsden Point will be an “offline” city meaning I will not be doing a Series on it.