Emerson Street Revitalisation

Emerson Street’s existing streetscape was upgraded over 30 years ago. Post Covid, there has been a distinct shift in the way people choose to shop with an increase in online shopping. A revitalised mixed-use streetscape will encourage people to spend more time on Emerson and improve vibrancy, thereby increasing ‘public life’ in the street and supporting economic viability.

The goals of the Emerson Street redesign are for it to enhance the amenity of the retail area, provide opportunities for social interaction, comprise consistent materials and features throughout and best practice urban design principles. It will establish a strong identity and sense of place for the inner city. It will reflect Napier’s heritage, celebrate its unique architecture and provide opportunities for innovation and contemporary response within the design.

The plan is for Emerson Street to have its own distinct identity extending down its length and dovetailing into the future piazza at the eastern end and Clive and Memorial Squares to the west. The Emerson St revitalisation project will be undertaken in four stages starting at the Squares. The Design Phase will begin early in 2024 and construction will start later that year.

Status

Community engagement has been completed to provide benchmark feedback and data. This report can be found here.

We have now engaged a Design Services team and this report will help inform the concept design due for completion by June 2024.

Example of previous work by the Design team can be found here.

Budget

Better off Funding has been provided by central government as part of the Three Water Reform process. This fund is to be used by Councils to improve amenity and provide positive community outcomes.

This project has been allocated $1.65 million of this Better off Fund. This will cover the full concept design of Emerson Street (Stages 1-4), detailed design of Stages 1 and 2 and some physical works in Stage 1.