Auckland City Council have, thankfully, decided to proceed with making Grafton Bridge bus only between 7am and 7pm, when it reopens next month. Grafton Bridge forms a key part of the Central Connector – effectively a semi-busway between Newmarket and Britomart along the route shown in the map below:
I had been a bit worried that the roads-loving Auckland City Council would look at allowing cars back onto this bridge at all hours of the day – making it highly likely the link would be clogged up and therefore making the whole idea of the central connector rather pointless. But it does seem that the council has made a sensible decision, and will proceed with the original plans.
The Central Connector is pretty close to being finished, and is due to open next month. Since I shifted house to Herne Bay back in March I haven’t used Symonds Street nearly as much as I used to – so I’m not sure whether the changes made so far have made much of a difference, but it will certainly have enormous benefits for Symonds Street in particular once complete – by providing 24 hour bus lanes and properly indented bus stops along a route that possibly carries more buses per day than any other road in Auckland. I drove along Symonds Street the other day and it seemed like everything between the Wellesley Street stop and Britomart is basically complete – although the bus lanes are only operational from Britomart to the Waterloo stop. Further ‘up’ Symonds Street, the road layout is all over the place, and a lot of road markings are still to be completed, but it certainly seems like all the major works are complete. Hopefully once the project is complete the days of having your bus take 20 minutes to crawl up Symonds Street will be over.
As you can see from the map to the left, if Grafton Bridge had been “left out” of the busway, it would have left a gaping hole in the middle of the project, and much of its benefits would have been lost. ARTA would have certainly been aware of the negative effects of allowing such a gap, and I imagine it was their pressure on the city council that went a long way towards ensuring they made this decision. This is mentioned in the report by council staff to the Transport Committee:
Both the New Zealand Transport Authority (NZTA) and Auckland Regional Transport Authority (ARTA) also support the current 7am to 7pm weekday for bus/cycle/pedestrian only operating scenario. NZTA and ARTA are also the major funders for the Central Connector project, contributing $20.4M and $13.7M respectively. NZTA and ARTA have indicated in their feedback that if the operating scenario is changed from the current proposal, then they might review the original City Council funding application. This represents a considerable funding risk to the project, which is nearing completion.
So perhaps Auckland City Councils hands were rather tied on the matter? Nevertheless, credit where credit’s due: they have made the right decision here. And I also must give some credit to Ken Baguley – the chairman of the Transport Committee. I have been critical of Mr Baguley in the past, as he was the one who first came up with the idea of splitting the Central Connector in two by allowing cars onto Grafton Bridge, but in recent times it certainly seems like he’s realised the necessity of good public transport. This seeming change of attitude is clear both in this decision, and also comes through very strongly in a couple of quotes he gave to an article in this month’s Metro magazine on Auckland’s transport:
Ken Baguley points out that it’s not even an argument about money. He says Joyce’s $1 billion a year for motorways should be pooled with existing public transport funding and allocated according to an overall set of priorities. “It shouldn’t be that contentious,” he says. “We line up the projects, do the comparative benefit analysis, and proceed accordingly.“
Wow, one pool of funding for transport. That sounds familiar. And:
Councillor Ken Baguley, chair of the Auckland City Council’s transport committee, says the CBD Rail Loop is the priority. He believes the loop is so widely accepted, “it’s not even a political issue any more”.
If Mr Baguley can be turned into a “born again public transport advocate”, perhaps there’s hope yet for Steven Joyce?
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There is plenty of scope for Joyce to change to pro-PT if you have a look at his business career, he is a pragmatic person, he just needs to realise that there is more potential for National by gaining votes in Auckland than than donations from the roading lobby…
He can help by making an unholy stink about anything less than full electrfication and then campaign for the CURL…
I use Symonds St when travelling on 240s buses (a few times a week), it makes some difference now (I still spend forever stuck on Waterloo Quad, I think it is, thats feeds onto Symonds) but the difference it will make in the future when completed is massive and obvious…
Good on the ACC although limited credit where credit is due as it looks like the funding became dependent on buses only (and so it should have, a case of different funding streams working..?)
I believe Joyce is rather pragmatic and will do what works within a budget. Something which is somewhat admirable in a politician, and not something any lobbyist at any of the spectrum is good at. The CBD rail tunnel wont go further under this term though, until electric trains are up and running there will be no appetite to consider capacity increases (and quite rightly so).
I’d suggest that the Grafton Bridge should also be open to HGVs up to the weight limit. There is no good reason to restrict parts of the network to vehicles that have no alternative, as long as it is not over capacity.
Exactly – the PT lobbyists need to get electrification off the ground first, and make sure it’s viable.
Liberty, he seems fine with splashing insane amounts of money on roads like Puhoi-Wellsford despite there being no cost-benefit analysis done so far for that route. He also seems fine spending close to a billion dollars widening the northwest motorway – once again proving that building motorways never solves congestion, it just shifts it. What next I wonder, widening the Hobsonville deviation that is not even finished?
Jarbury: The money for Puhoi-Wellsford is investigation – that DOES mean doing BCR analysis. $49.8m for investigation is serious work on a route that has had precious little spent on it. This is similar to what Transmission Gully has been getting. Hopefully from that will be the information we all want on what should be done. It IS a very long section of highway, so it will be an extensive study, which will take 4 years. Don’t expect any construction in that time, although money has been set aside for property purchases on sections of route where the solutions are obvious. The Northwest widening should be done by toll lanes, but few in NZ have the imagination to try that – I advocated it for the Manukau Harbour Crossing project. Widenings should be tolled if they are extensive long stretches of road.
No Puhoi to Wellsford for 4 years..? Thats good news, at least I’ll be in my 30s before I start losing my hair… Although mine will be from tearing it out not male pattern baldness…