This week, Christopher Luxon drew attention to a little-known parliamentary peril: crossing the road. One woman dared to give it a go. This is her harrowing account.
There comes a time in every person’s life when they are forced to confront their biggest fears. For some, it’s getting rid of the rat that keeps squeaking under your floorboards. For the Hayden Donnells of the world, it’s being cancelled in The Spinoff comment section. For prime minister Christopher Luxon, it’s Winston Peters – no, wait, it’s the strip of road outside parliament upon which a cyclist occasionally rides.
Few realise this, but outside the comforting confines of parliament lies a hellscape commonly known as Wellington city. Years of urbanist dictatorship has scarred this land into something unrecognisable, a dystopian skeleton of a city where civilians live in constant fear of being struck by Julie Anne Genter. “What you’ve got is a whole bunch of bike lanes up Molesworth Street that made it very difficult for me getting from my apartment into the parliamentary precinct,” said Luxon on Tuesday night, to a crowd of no doubt weeping voters in the Hutt Valley.
He’s not wrong. Ignoring the fact that Luxon hasn’t lived in that apartment complex since he moved into the refurbished Premier House in 2024, those six (or so) metres that separate Kate Sheppard Apartments and the parliamentary precinct are a daunting stretch of land. Especially if you’ve spent a long night next door at The Backbencher.
So here I am, standing at the precipice of life and death. Outside the Kate Sheppard Apartments a cold wind hits my face, and I imagine this is how Sir Edmund Hillary felt as he reached Mt Everest’s peak. Was he, too, weak in the knees as he looked across God’s creation and realised its vastness? I could almost shed a tear; the gulf separating me from the halls of power had never felt so wide.
There’s already a woman in front of me standing in the middle of the cycle lane, waiting for the world to stop and let her pass. My heart is racing for her. Is it a death wish? Should I be calling 111? As these thoughts race through my mind, she makes it to the other side. Phew. A close brush with death, narrowly avoided.
And then it was my turn. A significant breakthrough reveals itself immediately: this part of Molesworth Street is one-way, so I need only to turn my head to one side to check for oncoming hazards. Even so, I remain vigilant. You can never really rule out the possibility of a cyclist hooning along at 100km/h and killing you instantly. It’s a good thing nothing else travelling this road has that ability.
I make a move as the row of cars blocking the road is let free by a green light. I’m exposed out here in the wilderness, metaphorically naked as I walk what is possibly the country’s most dangerous road. The lights at the end of the street are blinding. The sounds of the traffic are ringing in my ears. Recent rainfall has made the road reek of petrichor. Is it the sensory overload of the experience that makes this walk difficult for Luxon? Perhaps we’ll never know.
After a harrowing few seconds on the road, my shoes make contact with the footpath on the other side of Molesworth Street. My heart skips a beat as I touch the precious stone wall separating the entitled and the commoners. I look around, hoping for a witness to my bravery. But, alas; some heroes are destined to serve in silence.
It all seemed far too easy, so I had another go. I needed to be sure it wasn’t a stroke of beginner’s luck that saved my life at that moment. But this time around, there were no cars (or cyclists) on the road – a clear path to success. Either our prime minister is lying through his teeth, or I may just be the luckiest girl in Wellington. I make a mental note to head to JJ Murphy’s on Cuba Street later and test this theory on the pokies.
As I looked back across the road less travelled, I understood the scale of Luxon’s despair. Sometimes it’s not about the road itself, but the agony of having to make a decision at all. To cross or not to cross? To let yourself be rolled by a few moany MPs or to not? To sack Winston Peters or to not? Often it feels easier to do nothing at all.
Then again, if Luxon ever truly feels his ability to wield power has been hindered by the canyon between the apartment he no longer lives in and his office, he could always use the pedestrian crossing at the traffic lights 10 metres up the road.
