I do agree about minimum parking requirements, and I have always agreed that any subsidies should be ended – but you can either argue against subsidies, or not. You argue that subsidies exist so there should be MORE subsidies. I disagree.

Viking2: Indeed, it is a rort. Public transport should operate commercially. It does between cities.

And how about minimum parking requirements etc.?

If this is true, then fuel will change, and more hybrid buses will appear, roads will be a little less congested and bus companies will make money (shock yes) in providing services people are prepared to pay full cost recovery fares for. Around a half of bus services in Auckland until recently made a profit, but that has been hit in part by the subsidised trains. Much of the road spending is on improvements that aren’t about capacity, but improving safety and fixing bottleneck intersections that mean the network doesn’t work efficiently. Roads wont be replaced by railways. There isn’t the slightest evidence that the road improvements being built will be unnecessary – higher oil prices will not make Auckland like Pyongyang, despite the wet dreams of some environmentalists.

People want personalised flexible transport. For commutes to central business districts in reasonable sized cities public transport can be a viable alternative, but for the 88% of Aucklanders who don’t work downtown it wont be an option for 95% of them. For rural and provincial towns, public transport can never be viable to the range of routes on a frequency that is useful.

I do wish all those who predict peak oil would put their money where their mouths are, speculate on oil futures going that high and use the profits from this speculation to invest in public transport systems charging the “stupid people who didn’t know better” fares to use the “essential railway that will be overcrowded” – so that taxpayers don’t take the risk, but that those who believe in it, do something for everyone else.

Funny how the Greens love gambling with other people’s money.

How many by 2025? How many by 2030?

If petrol is $5/l then an electric car that costs $100k may look like a fairly good deal.

Interestingly, I discovered that there was an extensive existing bus schedule with multiple operators. All due respect to the current diesel electric locos and the layout of the existing rail lines, an express bus service works out faster……if you do not travel at peak times as there are no bus lanes on the Auckland Southern Motorway.

However, admittedly, without subsidies for intercity buses, the fares would be steep for a commuter, approx $18 each way if you were lucky.

You could talk about environmental benefits of electric trains, but until we increase capacity of renewable electricity generation (windmills, hydroelectric, tidal etc projects), as well as a major track realignment (Could be possible alongside new expressway corridor) I think buses for now are our best option.

We need to reduce cross subsidisation as much as possible.

But if you want to spend my income tax or consumption tax then give me a proper bike lane not the execution style painted lines that dicks in offices create.

I agree.

It is ridiculous for bikes and cars to share the same network in the way we do now. Bikes must pay their own registration, warrants, and RUC and pay for their own cycle lane network instead of freeloading off motorists. They must also pay ACC rates that reflect their fatality rate of 14 times that of a car per km traveled.

So please tell me why you’d bother spending billions of dollars turning the rail system into a busway system, just to reduce its capacity and increase overcrowding?

Just to give some idea of how imbalanced the NLTP is, if we take Auckland we see the following splits between different types of transport investments:

Walking & Cycling – 0.9%
Transport Planning – 1.2%
Public Transport Improvements (the important one in my opinion – although this does exclude rail) – 6.1%
New state highways – 53.6%
New local roads – 6.8%
Public transport operating costs – 12.4%
State highway maintenance – 5.7%
Local road maintenance – 4.1%
State highway renewals – 3.5%
Local road renewal – 5.1%
Demand management – 0.7%

So… around 60% of the fund is for new roads, and 6.8% for new public transport. Once again, I do mention that rail is separate to this – although Joyce’s attitude towards rail seems to be “once I grudgingly pay for electrification that’s it forever!”

Vehicles should pay their full cost. If a truck cause 1000 x damage and requires a road to be 10 x stronger then a little car then that cost should be factored in.

We need to reduce cross subsidisation as much as possible.

But if you want to spend my income tax or consumption tax then give me a proper bike lane not the execution style painted lines that dicks in offices create.

You gain from having fewer cars on the road. Everyone does through lower transportation costs.

EVERYONE uses goods that are shipped by road and pays if we have inefficient infrastructure to transport these goods.

Public Transport costs the motorist as much as the passenger, and in NZ it is often far more expensive to the taxpayer than private travel. The flash rail networks in Europe etc cost billions of dollars and our cities can’t support that.

Not everyone is capable of operating personal transport

Taxis use roads also.