How Auckland gets a raw deal
One of my biggest hopes from the changes to Auckland’s local government currently underway is that we will have a stronger voice at the “bargaining table” with central government. I think there’s a reason why central governments have – over the past 150 years or so – avoided creating a strong and unified local government for Auckland, that reason being the risk that Auckland would become too powerful.…
33 Comments “Locking in” traffic benefits of motorway projects
A number of motorway projects underway at the moment – like the Manukau Connection, the Hobsonville Deviation and (not quite yet underway) the Waterview Connection – will have significant traffic reduction benefits for the local roads that they bypass. Well, actually I should say that these projects potentially will have significant traffic reduction benefits for local roads they bypass – because unless these benefits are ‘locked in’, over time it is inevitable they will be lost to induced demand.…
New Lynn Transport Centre – photos
I went and had a look at the finished product of the New Lynn transport centre today. It’s now finished, and the final product is incredibly impressive. Here are a number of photos:This is at the eastern end of the railway station.…
Is congestion pricing feasible for Auckland?
Every time you fill up your car with petrol a fairly significant amount of that cost is petrol tax – although by international standards we actually tax our petrol quite lightly. Petrol tax is something of a road-user charge, as it’s spent on transport activities to make life better for you as a road-user (at the moment it can’t be spent on rail infrastructure even though such projects create significant road-user benefits, but that’s a whole different argument).…
Bill English on transport & peak oil
An interesting question and answer session in parliament today between Russel Norman and Finance Minister Bill English. A transcript of the questions and answers can be read here. The first thing that I noted was how hesitant Mr English was in answering these questions.…
Fund the CBD rail tunnel with parking levies?
The big question mark surrounding what progress we can hope to make on the CBD Rail Tunnel in the next few years is “where is the funding going to come from?” If the project costs around $1.5 billion I have always thought a likely split would be central government funding around a billion (through NZTA and most likely through doing a cheaper and more cost effective Puhoi-Wellsford) and the Auckland region finding the remaining $500 million from local funding sources.…
Bike Lanes in New York
Here’s a great video on all the different types of bike lanes that New York City is implementing: I like the idea of tailoring the type of bus lane to the specific situation. In particular, if we can avoid the situation we ended up with over the Dominion Road debacle – and provide both on-street parking and cycle-lanes – then I think implementation will be that much easier.…
Anti-Spam Problems
For some reason WordPress is sending most comments into its spam box at the moment – which means that they won’t show up immediately. I’m not quite sure why this is happening as I have even deactivated the usual anti-spam plugin – but they’re still being caught.…
Learning from LA – PT marketing
Similar to yesterday’s post on New York, this is a great little video on the steps that Los Angeles’s transport agency has taken to improve the marketing of public transport – and to make public transport “cool”. A couple of things really stood out for me: the cleverness of using different coloured buses to indicate different service types – such as express services versus local services and some of the fantastic artwork that fills their train stations.…
Sorting out buses in the CBD
Last month, probably due to my travels, I missed out reporting on a quite interesting study that Auckland City Council has led into improving the flow of public transport in Auckland’s CBD. A summary of the report can be read here.…
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