WCC and Mayor support NZTA plan
April 21st, 2011 at 9:17 am by David FarrarDave Burgess at the Dom Post writes:
It is the mother of all U-turns from Wellington Mayor Celia Wade-Brown, who not only voted for her council to support the Government’s $2.4 billion roading projects package but proposed the motion.
The retreat at last night’s extraordinary meeting of Wellington City Council ended weeks of speculation and confirmed the council’s support of the New Zealand Transport Agency’s roading plan.
Its proposal includes a possible flyover to the north of the Basin Reserve, duplicate Terrace and Mt Victoria tunnels, and four-laning Ruahine St and Wellington Rd.
Excellent. The uncertainity is over.
The overall concept for the region is four lanes from the airport to Levin. That will make a huge difference, once completed. I (and I am sure the NZTA) am flexible on the exact details, so long as you achieve the goal. If that means a tunnel, instead of a flyover around the basin, so be it. But of course cost will be a major determinant.
It has also indicated that, for improvement to public transport, walking and cycling networks to occur, the roading issues need to be dealt with first.
Very rarely is it an option of roads or public transport. Almost all major cities need both. You need roads for buses and cyclists.
April 21st, 2011 at 9:27 am
Good to see the Luddite mayor Wade-Brown changed her hopeless and indefensible stance.
Will her Green Party comrades be horrified? You bet.
Vote:The Stone Age worshippers hate cars, roads, progress, modern life, and civilisation.
April 21st, 2011 at 9:31 am
Does this mean the erroneous charge of treason against Deputy Mayor McKinnon will be withdrawn and the people of Wellington will receive an apology for Mayor Brown’s intemperate public outburst?
Vote:Probably not.
April 21st, 2011 at 9:31 am
What a slap in the face for the Green Mayor, despite her attempts to quietly kill off the NZTA plan she has been forced to agree with the rest of her council.
This is a victory for democracy.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 9:40 am
What does the “green mayor” know that the Green party doesn’t?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:01 am
labrator: the green mayor understands what it’s like to be near the levers of power – you have to compromise and produce policies that keep a majority of people happy, not pontificate about theories that would never work. The green party will probably never work that out – they’re too fascinated by social engineering rather than environmental matters.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:05 am
gravedodger – the treason claim will be quietly dropped and there will be no apology. The Deputy Mayor and other Councillors will do what they can to salvage the dignity of the Mayor’s office. She should have recognised earlier that the Deputy Mayor holds the Ace of Spades but had been very reluctant to play it and should have swallowed rats accordingly.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:06 am
Ooooohhh now you’ve done it DPF! Waiting for all the people who subsist on a diet of fruit and nuts to pop out of the shrubbery.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:09 am
Another blow to the luddities.
Just shows that getting your people in there doesn’t mean you can over-ride what the people want. A lesson for them, perhaps.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:18 am
Celia Wade-Brown was bluffing – she just wanted to make sure the new motorway would be wide enough to do her U-turn.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:39 am
It sounds like the deputy mayor is a man of great integrity, if what you say is true peterwn, about salvaging the dignity of the mayors office.
Bloody shabby treatment of him by the mayor I would have thought.
Ah well at least we know that democracy can reign supreme even in the face of lunacy.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 11:25 am
The great thing about roads is their ongoing flexibility. The Romans built roads and we still use them. Build rail in the wrong place, or in a dying market and it closes because there is no alternative mode.
Roads on the other hand carry trucks, vans, cars, buses, taxis, shuttle-buses, motor cycles, and cyclists. Adjoining footpaths are comfortable for walkers. Try walking alongside a rail line.
Also all the above vehicles will soon be impacted by the new computer/internet technology that will impact on transport as much as it has on communications. Telecommuting is just the beginning. Try Avego and of course the convoyed trucks etc etc. Rail is going the way of the gestetner and the telex machine.
Wellington is an earthquake risk city so tunnels are really a no-no. We can build safe elevated highways (using NZ developed base isolation energy absorbing systems) and they operate during disasters. Even if nothing happens to a tunnel the panicking drivers are reluctant to use them – especially if they go below sea level. Remember how Lyttleton was isolated by a damaged tunnel. The roads kept working.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:00 pm
Roads rock. Bring them on everywhere. In NZ roads for public transport are the only affordable option with some limited scope for light rail. But in my experience buses are dirty and full of dangerous people. For buses we should have a first class section and a section for the drunks and other nasties. What little old lady wants to ride on a bus with people in gang regalia standing around.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:01 pm
Two questions:
1) What is the BCR to back this up? (I’ll give you a clue on the Transmission Gully section: less than 1)
2) What does the BCR become if petrol hits $3.00 a litre. Will we need the extra capacity the project provides. (I would give you a clue, but NZTA doesn’t even model this as part of a risk assessment for any motorway project).
Owen, I agree and fortunately Wellington is well covered by roads. The question is do we keep widening them ad infinitum?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:18 pm
Owen McShane (1,111) Says:
Remember how Lyttleton was isolated by a damaged tunnel. The roads kept working.
Not strictly true – The tunnel itself was fine, the control building was damaged so NZTA closed the tunnel.
Vote:The Summit road was closed between Dyers Pass Rd as it was blocked by Rock Falls. (And a Petrol Tanker !)
April 21st, 2011 at 12:32 pm
@Owen McShane, 11:25am
‘The Romans built roads and we still use them.’ Was that before or after the Maori’s turned up?
‘Remember how Lyttleton was isolated by a damaged tunnel. The roads kept working.’ Actually about 50% of Christchurch’s roads have been damaged and will need millions in repairs but the damage to the railway lines was minimal.
‘Rail is going the way of the gestetner and the telex machine.’ Not in cities like London, rail based public transport is the only way to move lots of people in a large and densely populated city.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:36 pm
That may be so, however we still need roads to move people and goods from trains to their destinations. Roads+Rail go hand in hand.
Furthermore, when a road is damaged it is often still traversable. The same cannot be said for Rail.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:36 pm
The roads forever brigade labeling public transport proponents as Luddites is getting increasingly lame.
Look at any major city in the world; continued public transport and walking and cycling development are what make these cities functional and livable. No-one in these cities points at public transport users and laughs at their Luddism, no, they sit alongside relieved that they have an efficient means of getting from A to B that doesn’t require filling up at A and finding a park at B. It will be the ones stuck in their cars that we laugh at, which is what I already do while biking to work.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:43 pm
Way to go, decanker. Make us happy and export yourself to any of these “wonderful cities” you rave about.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 12:46 pm
@Manolo that’s actually an excellent suggestion Manolo, but another subsequent hit to the Government’s books. Maybe I’ll stop paying off my student loan while I’m over there too.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:08 pm
The car in traffic would be my preferred option every time. Love it.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:10 pm
Roads are the future, rail is the past.
We need public transport, but it is wrong to say we don’t need more road capacity. Buses need roads, and the private vehicle, no matter what the power source, isn’t going away. Roading in Wellington is way behind schedule….
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:15 pm
“For buses we should have a first class section and a section for the drunks and other nasties.”
That section would be on the side of the road. Drivers should be vested with authority to decline boarding attempts by anyone that looks a bit unpleasant. This would undoubtedly increase patronage.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:17 pm
Yep. Leather seats. Clean and spacious. Toasty warm, whilst a howling southerly batters the capital. Time to contemplate.
Contrasted with standing on some crowded bus, jammed between some beard wearer with a laissez-faire attitude to bathing, and a group of wet teenagers banging out their favourite “tunes”.
No thanks……
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Why not? It’ll be a win for all concerned: the country and yourself. After all, who is going to miss your debt of $135 total?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 1:41 pm
Now I can see why we owe $300 mill per week.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:03 pm
Newsflash – in a surpise announcement today, Wellington Mayor C. Wade-Brown declatred that all future fire and ambulance services in the city would operate on railway tracks and will cease to use roads to access people needing their services. “We would have insisted that Police do likewise” she is quoted as saying after an extra-ordinarily secret council meeting attended by a quorum of one, “but we have yet to get control over Police National Headquarters policy and as yet they have not seen the light. As of Monday, anyone needing Fire or ambulance services will be required to bring their burning house or injured person to the nearest station for treatment” ends
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:05 pm
Not that Celia Wade-Brown had much change of getting re-elected, but it is likey all the bad publicity about her initial decision and her eleventh-hour change of heart have dashed the possibility of the Luddite being returned to office. Hooray!
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:12 pm
Manolo (3,886) Says:
April 21st, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Maybe I’ll stop paying off my student loan while I’m over there too.
Why not? It’ll be a win for all concerned: the country and yourself. After all, who is going to miss your debt of $135 total?
That’s the kind of inspired logic that has this country borrowing $300m a week to fund tax cuts.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:26 pm
Tunnel failures.
I was a bit sloppy in my reporting there but mainly because the media reporting was to start with.
However, tunnel failure in emergencies is as often as not the controlling equipment, including extraction fans etc, as the tunnel walls.
And while roads are damaged they are a network and people can still get around. When a major rail line is destroyed it normally throws out the whole network.
THis is why underground rail is so popular with terrorists.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:35 pm
The BCR for this road is crap because the road doesn’t go anywhere- how many export earning industries does Levin have? Getting public servants to work 15 minutes quicker actually doesn’t help economic growth.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 2:38 pm
Owen McShane says: “Wellington is an earthquake risk city so tunnels are really a no-no.”
You clearly don’t know what you are talking about. Tunnels are well known by engineers to perform in general substantially better than surface structures under seismic loading. This calls into question the rest of your pontifications on this site and others that you speak about with such conviction.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 3:21 pm
For me…….we need roads and public transport.
I agree that all the most livable cities in the world have good public transport. This can be trams (aka light rail – I rather calling them trams actually), trains, or buses. However, all these cities also have very substantial roading networks.
The problem with public transport is time and network effects. Things people don’t like are changing transport mode, lack of frequency, and lack of network size (i.e. can you get where you want, when you want, on public transport).
What this means is that public transport is hard to create piecemeal. It’s kind of an all or nothing investment, it’s also a generational investment – you build it today, people gradually move houses to be close to public transport (creating density near public transport stops), and businesses move to be close to transport terminals. Over 20-30 years, this creates a city that people want to live in. In the short term, this creates a large expense that looks like it isn’t working.
The question is, if you start with a blank sheet of paper (as we are), and try to put in a public transport solution, how would you do it? My answer is:
1. You need something you can grow incrementally. Like buses
2. You need something that isn’t overly centralised. Like buses
3. You need something that avoids the traffic – like trains or trams in dedicated tramways or buses in dedicated busways
4. You need something that’s cost efficient. Not many options there – so probably just suck up the cost
5. You need something environmentally friendly. That probably means electric or hybrid. For my money, gas/hybrid buses
6. You need something that runs with high frequency. Any transport mode can do that, buses are quicker to scale up
In short, I think buses are probably the answer. They can do anything a train can do, and also do a bunch of things a train can’t. If we’re going to put them in, then we need to be prepared to invest for 10-20 years before they turn a profit. And even then, the profit we’re turning is a social profit, not a cash profit.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 4:55 pm
I agree with all your points @PaulL. Another important point is node transfer to enable transition. Auckland at the moment has introduced the Park’n'Rides across the city and these are proving very popular. Mostly because they’re being run like trains (they have their own independent bus lanes) and in fact they may get replaced with train lines as time, and the bridge, allows.
Wellington already has a significant investment in its train lines but they don’t go to enough places people want, it basically stops at the stadium. This creates a transfer node which eliminates so many of the benefits of the train in the first place. If they could some how get it to run right through town and then the airport it would be a game changer in my opinion. I also believe it is important to sort out the motorway so it isn’t the 4 lanes@100, 3lanes @80, stop light, 2 lanes @ 50 etc etc variable monstrosity it is at the moment.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 6:24 pm
What I don’t get is why greenies advocate geater public transport and cycling. As a cyclist you can have one or the other but not both. I have no worries about cars even if theyre doing 70 but even at 30 being squashed by a bus (which almost happens to me almost every day) would likely be fatal.
Getting rid of buses (most of which are nearly empty anyway) would be one of the best things to do to make cycling safer and therefore encourage more of it happening.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 6:42 pm
London is a metropolis of 12 Million which has grown out virtually concentrically due to it’s favourable topography. A mass transit system there is viable. Wellington consists of around 400k in a topographically challenged environment. Does any one really think that a rail based mass transit system is an economically sustainable option?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 6:52 pm
I don’t get it. The vote was won 10-5, with the mayor voting aye. She could have stuck to her principles and still it would have been won 9-6. Unless she thought it was such an important vote the Mayor had to support it.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 7:11 pm
Owen, in the 1989 San Francisco earthquake did the Bay Bridge or the BART tunnel break?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 7:16 pm
No, with the exception of the Luddite mayor Wade-Brown and her fellow watermelons.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 8:35 pm
I think it’s viable where the rails already exist. No point in ripping out what we have. And to some extent Wellington has grown along the rail lines, as cities often do. I think it sort of works, but doesn’t have enough frequency / reliability / comfort. That’s solvable. For the rest of Wellington, buses are clearly the go. Pull out the trolley buses – too often broken, and visual pollution from the wires. Replace with gas turbine/hybrid (relatively quiet, relatively non-polluting, have the torque/power to grind up Wellington hills). Push through the 4 lane highway, which pulls a lot of cars off the road. Put in some decent car parks near that motorway, and offer a very frequent and free bus from there up and down the city – keep cars out of the centre.
Same with a bus from the train station. In fact, if you do it right, you can run driverless trams – then you can make them as frequent as you like. If they’re free, nothing really to worry about with them. Something like the trams/trains that run between terminals in KL airport. Only issue is idiots who walk in front of them – so they’d need anti-collision devices. Some idiot would then stand in front of them and stop them, screwing up the schedule. You could just have police patrol for idiots like that, or have concerned citizens beat the crap out of them to stop them doing it…..
Anyway, a well designed and funded system consisting of:
– clean and frequent trains on the existing lines
– quiet and frequent buses everywhere else
– carless lanes or streets for the buses to run on
– free buses in key locations, encouraging people not to drive in the core city, and to ride the train
– good park and ride at the major train stations in the burbs – so you can justify driving to the train
It’d be beaut. I reckon heaps of people would use it. Bloody expensive though.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 8:35 pm
The Gold Coast is building a 13km light rail line. That’s the distance from Ngauranga to the Airport.
- They have a higher population than Wellington
- they have more visitors than Wellington
- they have an easier topography
- THat line is budgeted at c$1billion AUD
- a 2004 study said it would cost only $350m of that for a longer line
We are kidding ourselves if we think this is a realistic option for Wellington. It will be it’s Think Big and financially cripple it for years to come. CWB needs to face facts – real ones, not ones she’d like to be true
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:20 pm
insider (666) Says:
April 21st, 2011 at 8:35 pm
Heh. 666
Light rail is, to my mind, good where you already have it, or for short tourist type routes. It’s basically a tram. It’s nice in Chch, I liked it in Amsterdam, it’s very cool in Melbourne. I could imagine trams along Lambton Quay – free ones that people could jump on and off. That’d be good, but it’s not exactly a solution for the whole city.
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:25 pm
As opposed to a motorway from Wellington airport to Levin costing $1bn ++, with a cost benefit less than 1?
Vote:April 21st, 2011 at 10:51 pm
$2.4 billion I think campit. Quite a lot of coin.
Vote:April 22nd, 2011 at 1:02 am
campit
I’d say the same if the total costs were being borne solely by the ratepayers of wellington, as will happen with light rail. NZTA will not fund it. Fortunately petrol buyers of the country are paying that couple of billion.
Vote:April 22nd, 2011 at 9:15 am
My apologies for this late posting, but, for those of us who may have very long memories:
Wellington did at one time have an extensive tram system that worked very well, and with rails running from Wadestown to Island Bay. The system was integrated with the suburban railway system, with the result that one could catch a tram from Island Bay, into the city, walk through the station and catch a unit to Paekak’, Jville or The Hutt. The system worked well and proved to be an excellent mass-transit system. BUT, the trams were eventually deemed to be ‘so old fashioned’ and because ‘progress is all’ were scrapped in the early 60′s in favor of ‘trackless trams’ (aka – Trolley Buses.). ‘Cost’ (especially of the ‘overhead’ wires) was sighted as the main reason for their removal, yet curiously, the ‘trolley buses still use the self-same assemblage. In reality (and in hindsight) there was a very definite ‘anti-tram’ lobby who were determined to remove trams at any cost. The ‘trolley’s were seen as a ‘modern’ alternative. The ‘Trolley-ists’ won of course, yet significantly Wellington later purchased the redundant Auckland trolleys and committed themselves to retaining the trolleys – the current situation (bad pun I’m afraid).
It should also be remembered that the Hutt-Valley suburbs were designed to have bus services that feed into the trains and thence into the city (Waterloo is a classic example), and that when all the designing for the new Hutt Valley suburbs (and those in the adjacent valleys) was being undertaken (during the late 40′s) the train/tram connection was considered to be of paramount importance.
Subsequently the ‘light rail’ protagonists have advocated the return of trams (light rail being the modern term for trams), but times have changed and the cost of putting tracks back into teh city would be excessive and highly disruptive (imagine Lambton Quay being blocked for months. . . ). Some sort of walk-in walk-out seat ‘personal’ monorail running between the buildings is theoretically possible, but monorails are initially expensive to construct and impractical for the outer suburbs. On this basis therefore (Ms W-B notwithstanding) Wellington is stuck with cars and the internal combustion engine. It is unfortunately too late to alter things; Wellington City Councilors made their choices (supposedly with their ratepayers support) and now their successors have to live with the consequences. – sorry Ns W-B, you have no chance of altering anythign. ‘Your’ city won’t allow it. . .
Vote:April 22nd, 2011 at 9:38 am
Some interesting numbers to ponder:
Wellington’s population is around 400,000, Auckland’s is 1.4 million – so $2.4 billion in Wellington is (on a per capita basis) equivalent to $8.4 billion in Auckland.
From 2006-2031 Wellington’s population is expected to grow by around 75,000, over the same period Auckland’s population is expected to grow by 575,000 (7.7 times as much). Under that measure, $2.4 billion in Wellington is (on a per extra person basis over the next 25 years) equivalent to $18.4 billion in Auckland.
Vote:April 22nd, 2011 at 7:04 pm
All the more reason to ask that the project has a benefit cost ratio greater than 1. Or are you saying that $2.5bn taxed from road users every year should be guaranteed funding to be spent on any project NZTA desires?
Vote:April 23rd, 2011 at 4:13 pm
Wade-Brown has been nobbled as the mayor which has to be positive for Wellington. She has now been rolled on the major decisions by McKinnon and his team and there is common sense coming through from the Wellington City Council for the first time in years. The tantrum last week was the culmination of the frustration Wade-brown has with being a mayor without the support of her council which has put paid to her agenda of loopy policies
Vote: