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    Overcoming barriers to delivering active travel infrastructure: inter-agency collaboration in a state-led neighbourhood redevelopment
    (Elsevier Ltd on behalf of World Conference on Transport Research Society, 2025-12) Opit SL; Witten K
    This research investigates the challenges to collaboration government agencies face in delivering active travel infrastructure as part of neighbourhood regeneration projects. Through a sociotechnical systems lens, we examine the influence of governance structures, decision-making processes, and institutional norms on inter-agency collaboration. Drawing on document analysis and key informant interviews, we identify opportunities and challenges faced by housing and transport agencies in coordinating the design and delivery of active travel infrastructure. Challenges include a disconnect between strategic objectives and funding mechanisms, bureaucratic inertia and complexity, and a reliance on informal networks within a complex regulatory structure. Despite these challenges, the research highlights the value of forums for knowledge exchange and relational approaches to collaboration, as well as the potential for pragmatic solutions such as collaborative working groups to overcome structural barriers within sociotechnical regimes. Achieving mode shift towards healthier and more sustainable forms of transport requires formalised effective mechanisms for integration of land use and transport planning. Our findings have implications for policymakers, practitioners, and stakeholders involved in shaping urban environments and promoting active mobility as a viable transportation option.
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    Placemaking for tenant wellbeing: Exploring the decision-making of public and community housing providers in Aotearoa New Zealand
    (Elsevier Ltd, 2025-06) Witten K; Olin CV; Logan A; Chisholm E; Randal E; Howden-Chapman P; Leigh L
    In addition to housing tenants, many public and community housing providers engage in placemaking to foster tenants’ connections to people and place. This paper reports on the placemaking practices of four community housing providers and two urban regeneration programmes in Aotearoa New Zealand. Twenty-four semi-structured interviews were conducted with provider staff – including those leading strategy, community development, tenancy management, planning and design efforts – to investigate the placemaking strategies adopted by providers and the values, priorities and investment tensions that underpin their decision-making. Common placemaking strategies included site selection to secure tenants’ locational access to community services and amenities, and designing shared ‘bump spaces’ into housing complexes to encourage neighbourly encounters between tenants. Efforts to foster a sense of community through increased stability and diversity of households were hindered by a predominance of single-person units in older housing developments, and by funding and regulatory constraints. Māori, the Indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand, comprise approximately half of all public housing tenants and many have deep intergenerational connections to place. Where providers were engaging with Māori, early steps had been taken to incorporate cultural landscapes and values into placemaking initiatives; such practices were more evident in urban regeneration than community housing provider developments, enabled by longer-term planning horizons, broader development mandates and partnerships with iwi (Māori tribes) and local government. Nonetheless, placemaking aspirations of all providers were tethered to resource constraints and investment trade-offs, with any social infrastructure provision weighed up against the value of providing one more home instead.
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    Unlocking Transport Innovation: A Sociotechnical Perspective of the Logics of Transport Planning Decision-Making within the Trial of a New Type of Pedestrian Crossing
    (Building Better Homes, Towns, and Cities (BBHTC) National Science Challenge, 2018-06-01) Opit S; Witten K
    This paper considers the proposal to install a novel type of pedestrian crossing, as part of a neighbourhood intervention, to investigate the architecture of decision-making that influences the delivery and outcomes of our urban environments. While political and policy-making directions often signal a movement towards providing better active transport options and safer urban environments for pedestrians and cyclists, delivering projects that achieve such goals can prove challenging, time-consuming and be marred by conflict. Innovative projects can stagnate, diminish in scale or fail to be realised entirely. The exact causes of these less than ideal outcomes are difficult to determine as they involve a complex sociotechnical assemblage of various actors, institutions, resources and logics. The architecture of decision-making that surrounds these projects is created through a myriad of de jure and de facto actors that, in concert, affect the material construction of neighbourhoods and shape our homes, towns and cities In Auckland, the regional Road Controlling Authority (RCA), ‘Auckland Transport’ (AT), dedicates a chapter in its ‘code of practice’ outlining its commitment to enabling innovative solutions where appropriate. Yet, as political demands for a modal shift towards active and public transport have gradually intensified, the organisation has sometimes struggled to adapt from ‘business-as-usual’ practices that prioritise goals associated with the private motor vehicle, such as road network capacity and flow efficiency (particularly, alleviating peak hour congestion problems).
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    Summary report: Developing community: Following the Waimahia Inlet affordable housing initiative
    (Building Better Homes, Towns, and Cities (BBHTC) National Science Challenge, 2019-01-01) Witten K; Opit S; Ferguson E; Kearns R
    This brief report summarises findings of a longitudinal case study of the Waimahia Inlet housing development. A more detailed analysis can be found in Witten, Opit, Fergusson and Kearns (2018). Waimahia Inlet is an affordable housing development located in Weymouth on an estuary of the Manukau Harbour, 23 km south of the Auckland CBD and 5km southwest of Manukau City centre. It was developed by Tāmaki Makaurau Community Housing Limited (TMCHL), an incorporated body comprising the Tāmaki Collective, Te Tumu Kāinga, Community of Refuge Trust (CORT) and the New Zealand Housing Foundation. This consortium of Māori organisations and community housing providers (CHPs) shared a mission to provide affordable, good-quality housing, with a focus on meeting the housing needs of Maori and Pasifika families. Waimahia is an interesting case study of affordable housing provision for a number of reasons: • its 295 dwellings make it Aotearoa’s largest third sector housing development; • the complementary expertise of the consortium partners enabled an innovative organisational structure to be developed to finance and deliver the development; • it is a mixed tenure neighbourhood with 70% of homes either assisted home-ownership (shared equity and rent-to-buy/home saver) or retained by the community housing providers as affordable rentals; and • 50 % of households are Māori and 15% Pasifika.
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    Challenging the inequities of ebike access: An investigation of a community-led intervention in a lower-income neighbourhood in Aotearoa - New Zealand
    (Elsevier B.V., 2024-09) Witten K; Opit S; Mackie H; Raja A
    Introduction Ebiking offers positive physical and mental health benefits for riders. However, inequitable access to bike share schemes and purchase cost barriers limit ebike availability and uptake in lower-income communities. Furthermore, as bike culture differs from place to place, incentive schemes responsive to the local culture are needed to improve access to ebikes as a healthy mobility choice. Methods Three trials of ebike access were co-designed sequentially between 2021 and 2023. Give-it-a go, Ebikes in daily life, Pathway to Permanence were all designed by a community bike organisation working in tandem with a research team. Trial delivery was community-led. Trial participants’ experiences of ebike use were gathered through group and individual interviews, and the research also included a brief before and after survey of trip destination and mode use. Results Trial participants valued their ebiking experience, including the skills training and group rides, new knowledge of safe routes, health benefits of exercise, and fuel savings. During the trial, a third of weekly trips were made by ebike, while trips made by motor vehicle reduced by 25%. Cost emerged as a substantial barrier to ebike ownership. Conclusions Effective models to support ebike uptake in lower-income communities will be characterised by: adequate funding of community organisations to grow local bike culture; safe and secure bike infrastructure; community ownership of an ebike fleet to support skill acquisition and social connection; and a pathway to low-cost ebike access.
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    Street redesign, active mobility and well-being for Pacific elders
    (Taylor and Francis Group, 2024-08-08) Garden E; Sa’u Lilo L; ‘Ofanoa M; Field A; Witten K; So’onalole TN; Tupou S
    This qualitative study uses Talanoa methodologies to explore the everyday experiences of Pacific elders travelling around Māngere Central, Aotearoa New Zealand. A suite of street infrastructure changes for walking and cycling took place in the area between 2015 and 2017. While the evidence linking attributes of urban street design to physical activity behaviour is strong, there is little research on the impact of the built environment on Pacific elders’ active mobility. The study seeks to address this knowledge gap by focusing on the impacts of streetscape changes on the active travel and social connectivity of this group of residents. Findings indicate that post-intervention, elders feel significantly safer while walking, with active travel increasing for some. All elders in the study feel that important amenities are now more accessible, with some of significant cultural and social importance. As such, opportunities for social connection appear to have increased. Furthermore, the enhanced look and feel of the local environment is important to the elders interviewed, enhancing feelings of community pride and well-being for some. Further desired changes to support active mobility are discussed, and a logic model highlighting factors theorised to be particularly important for achieving mode shift among Pacific elders is proposed.
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    Community use of school grounds outside of school hours
    (Taylor and Francis Group, 2024-07-13) Lin E-Y; Witten K; Carroll P; Parker K
    Physical activity in childhood is essential for healthy development and wellbeing and school grounds can provide neighbourhood access to safe play spaces. This study examines the relationship between school demographics (school size, school decile, ethnicity of students and population density) and whether school grounds are open or closed for community use outside school hours. Data were gathered from 391 primary and intermediate schools across Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland), Aotearoa New Zealand (84% of Auckland schools) with 250 schools participating in the full survey. The results indicate that higher school decile and lower population density are associated with school grounds being available for community use. This result is concerning. With closed school grounds more likely to be in lower socio-economic and higher population density areas, the children most affected are the same group who have fewer opportunities and less spaces for active play. The main reason schools closed their grounds was ‘vandalism /graffiti/theft concerns’. Low decile schools whose grounds were open outside of school hours shared a similar commitment to involve their communities widely in school activities and found doing so decreased the levels of vandalism. Their approach may offer useful insights to schools that are currently closed.
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    Placemaking and public housing: the state of knowledge and research priorities
    (Taylor and Francis Group, 2023-05-08) Chisholm E; Olin C; Randal E; Witten K; Howden-Chapman P
    This article examines the international literature on placemaking–practices or initiatives that encourage a sense of place–in public housing communities. Placemaking is likely to be particularly beneficial to public housing tenants, and is a current priority for public housing providers; yet reviews of placemaking research have failed to consider public housing. Our systematic quantitative review of 63 English-language journal articles reveals that the field is dominated by qualitative cross-sectional studies conducted in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, in the context of regeneration, and published in social science journals. Our thematic analysis of this literature shows that placemaking is supported by forming relationships and participating in community activities, by access to quality public space and amenities, and by spending time and forming memories in a place. The review therefore provides guidance to public housing providers and reveals the need for particular research, including longitudinal studies, and studies conducted in both redeveloped and existing communities.
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    Toward a Framework for Resilience Assessments: Working Across Cultures, Disciplines, and Scales in Aotearoa/New Zealand
    (Frontiers Media S.A., 2020-05-14) Coulson G; Moores J; Waa A; Kearns R; Witten K; Batstone C; Somervell E; Olivares G; Howden-Chapman P
    Resilience appears within diverse literatures across the physical and social sciences, pervades social, and ecological systems models and has been mobilized in the quest to change environmental practices at local and international levels. Yet common language is needed to enable cross-disciplinary conversations. We discuss a novel interdisciplinary process identifying shared terminology and developing a framework to facilitate the integration of physical and social science understandings of urban infrastructure and resilience in urban systems. Drawing on bicultural knowledge traditions unique to Aotearoa/New Zealand, we reflect on resilience as a system property having ecological, social, economic and technical dimensions that influence well-being and sustainability outcomes.
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    Te Ara Mua – Future Streets: Can a streetscape upgrade designed to increase active travel change residents’ perceptions of neighbourhood safety?
    (Elsevier Ltd, 2022) Witten K; Macmillan A; Mackie H; van der Werf B; Smith M; Field A; Woodward A; Hosking J
    We aim to understand how a streetscape intervention, Te Ara Mua- Future Streets, designed to improve the ease and safety of active modes, influenced perceptions of neighbourhood safety and security in Māngere, New Zealand. In this controlled intervention study, survey, focus group and in-depth interview data on neighbourhood perceptions were gathered from adults and children in 2014 and 2017, before and after the intervention. General Linear Mixed Modelling (GLMM) was used to undertake a difference in differences analysis of the individual level survey data on traffic and neighbourhood safety perceptions. Focus group and interview data were analysed thematically. Survey data indicate improvements in neighbourhood safety but not traffic safety perceptions after the streetscape upgrade. Conversely, focus group and interview data suggest enduring fears around people and dogs, but an easing of traffic-related fears attributed to safer crossings and slower vehicle speeds. Our contrasting quantitative and qualitative findings demonstrate a complex interplay of neighbourhood people and place attributes in shaping residents’ experiences of safety and security, and therefore the importance of combining personal safety and traffic safety, as well as multiple measures, when investigating pathways between built environment change and active travel.