Bringing the “place” function into a road classification

In New Zealand, the One Network Road Classification (ONRC) is the reference system for roads and streets categorisation. It was primarily developed for maintenance purposes and relied therefore heavily on the value of the volumes of traffic.

Within my role at the New Zealand Transport Agency, I was asked to help the working committee within the effort of updating the classification so to better account for the diverse functions of streets, namely by addressing the question of the “place” – what are the potentials for “place”, how can they be assessed, in what ways could a bi-dimensional link-place approach improve the functional categorisation, and how could existing data be used to inform new metrics?

This was a most exciting undertaking, prefiguring an evidence-based decision support for streets and linking with both international best practice and local developments such as Auckland’s Roads and Streets Framework.

Illustrations: own sketch and photos.