There was an interesting question and answer session in parliament today between the Green Party’s Gareth Hughes and Finance Minister Bill English, over the government’s infrastructure investment priorities and how they may be affected by rising fuel prices:
The full text of the debate can be read here.
If I’m being somewhat generous to Bill English, it seems that he has finally gathered a slightly better understanding of the fact that rising fuel prices may actually impact on things like road use and public transport use. In the past it seemed that many of his responses on this issue amounted to nothing more than “people will drive no matter what the price is”, which is pretty stupid and ignores what’s actually been happening in recent years.
Yet many of his responses still seem somewhat ‘out of touch’. Does he realise how expensive hybrid cars are? Does he realise how far away we are from mass producing fully electric cars at a price affordable to the general public? Could he please explain actually how public transport will benefit from the Roads of National Significance? One of these RoNS, Transmission Gully, is actually quite likely to completely undermine a big section of the Wellington rail network – something that a lot of money has just been spent (and continues to be spent) on significantly upgrading.
Furthermore, while it may be technically true that the government is spending more on public transport than ever before, inflation plus the significantly increasing number of people using PT mean that what really should be of interest is the share of transport funding that is being dedicated to PT. If funding is to follow the mode experiencing growth – which seems like a fairly logical thing to do – then the graph below indicates that PT funding should be increasing significantly and taking a larger slice of the funding pie than before:
These figures just cover the Auckland area of course, but Auckland does seem to be the main area of transport debate at the moment.
Instead of responding to this growth rate, a cabinet paper by Steven Joyce noted how proud he was of “capping” public transport funding at 2008 levels, only adjusted for inflation:
I must say it seems kind of weird to boast about capping the funding of public transport services when patronage in your biggest city has increased by over 20% in three years; while you spend billions more on motorways when traffic on them is declining.
Rather weird indeed.
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What else could you expect from the Hillbilly mayor of Double Dipton. The man is a complete waste of space.
And as for Joyce, Is is so far out in right field, one could be forgiven for thinking that generous Kohas are going his way.
Hasn’t the road lobby tied these guys up with no room to wriggle…. Among the obvious flaws in his so called reasoning; what do buses run on as well as the road? er diesel. And is he budgeting to supply every household with a as yet non existent electric car, to go with the fleets of electric trucks too…. er have you costed that yet? And is that on top of the 11 billion lost on RoNs? They really are almost comic, the problem is that we’re stuck with these pea-brians for a while yet.
Just wait for trouble to spread to somewhere like Nigeria and we’ll be testing those 2008 oil price records soon enough.
No might not have to wait for that, Ahmadinejad is saying he thinks oil is to cheap and should be $150 per barrel.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10717254
Agreed that hybrid cars are too expensive for general use, but they’ll inevitably become cheaper over time. Some diesels are already more fuel efficient than hybrids and since they’re no more expensive than other small cars then we’d expect to see more of them in the short term. Figures from the US show that hybrid drivers typically drive 25% more distance than non-hybrid drivers. Part of this may be due to heavy users seeing more benefit from converting to a hybrid. But it seems that some of this is due to drivers adjust their driving to fit a budget, and because hybrid drivers feel less guilt about using their cars. So it may be that increased fuel efficiency in the vehicle fleet will result in increased vehicle use overall.
The “less guilt” thing is interesting because in the US hybrid cars are involved in proportionally more accidents and receive more tickets than non-hybrids. I’ve seen this attributed to the moral superiority of hybrid drivers that was the subject of a recent South Park episode.
As for the video, I think Hughes would have been better off addressing his questions to Len Brown and other mayors since local public transport is primarily a council responsibility. If a worker in Flat Bush can’t catch a bus to work then the Mayor should be fixing the problem, not Bill English.
“As for the video, I think Hughes would have been better off addressing his questions to Len Brown and other mayors since local public transport is primarily a council responsibility. If a worker in Flat Bush can’t catch a bus to work then the Mayor should be fixing the problem, not Bill English.”
Yes that is correct except that the councils are effectively not allowed to spend any more money on PT as they have already used up all of the planned budget for it. Of course they could re prioritise spending a bit but many of the projects have already had NZTA funding approved and changing them would impact this.
Councils can generally spend their income as they see fit. The missing Flat Bush bus service that Hughes was talking about is apparently a lower priority for Auckland Council than every other public transport service and every other council service such as operation of cemeteries, dog control, graffiti management, recycling, the Maori advisory committee, arts projects, investment in Australian regional airports, RWC “party” services, and Trash to Fashion shows in schools. If that is the case then why does Hughes think it should be a high priority for English? If Hughes thinks that the priorities are wrong then he should take that up with the Council. If Hughes thinks Auckland should be increasing rates to fund lower priority services like extra Flat Bush bus services then he could talk to the Council about that too.
The issue is that NZTA’s subsidies for PT services have been capped making it difficult to improve services.
So the Council can subsidise or operate the Flat Bush service rather than spending the money on, say, free entry to swimming pools. Auckland transport is the responsibility of the Auckland Council, even if it is partly financed by central government.
There is one problem with the vision of a hybrid/electric transport saviour: REMs (Rare Earth Metals)….
We continue live on such a small, and shrinking, planet 🙁
The main problem with a transport future being rescued by hybrid/electric vehicles is: REMs (Rare Earth Metals). What is the problem? It in the group name: RARE …
Take a look: http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=rare+earth+metals+scarcity+reserves
The change that needs to happen is more fundamental than just changing the power system in our vehicles.
Crown Minerals report number 17 states “Despite their name, the REE are in fact not especially rare. Each is more common in the earth’s crust than silver, gold or platinum, while cerium, yttrium, neodymium and lanthanum are more common than lead”. The report goes on to detail rare earth deposits in New Zealand.
You see a threat. I see an opportunity.
it is easy to see why everybody (sic) says that National will be landslide victors in the election later this year. i mean, so much talent and dynamic, original thinking as well as a track record of successfully managing the economy through troubled waters. the Roads of National Party Significance are the best idea since sliced bread laced with rat poison, i can’t imagine who would be agaisnt them. this cabinet is so practical and down to earth, the maggots are just oozing out of their ears and nostrils. a better cake hole a blow fly could not find. “let them drive electric cars!” brilliant!!! [/SARCASM]
The justification that motorways provide public transport is very, very strange. The divorce from reality is staggering. Yes buses need roads but they’re already there Bill. No need for a 6 lane motorway about it.
also people who spout rubbish about ‘buses need roads to’ should look at how many buses actually use the motorway network. And the answer is very few. The NW services use the motorway bus but just a few short sections. Then you have the airbus that uses the motorway from the airport to Onehunga, then a couple of peak time expresses from around Manakau.
Also looking at he RONS I’m don’t think there is public transport on any of the routes involved.
“Roads need train tracks too”
LOL
Where is our so-called opposition? They’re doing a wonderful job – not.
I have got to the point where I absolutely LOATHE national and everything they do/say, I can’t believe I voted for them last time. Deffianately wont be making that mistake again.
Not sure who I will be voting for, but I am dam sure I know who I WONT be voting for.
The opposition in this case is Green.
Any one who thinks it will be business as usual for net oil importers like NZ over the next decade should read this: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7767
The failure by this government to even grasp our vulnerability to the international oil situation is criminal, the fact that they are borrowing billions to commit us further to oil dependency in insane.
We need to be running as fast as we can in the completely opposite direction that this government is taking. Are they just stupid or corrupt or both?
This is incredible:
“We have asked the New Zealand Transport Agency what oil price assumptions are used in their latest models for the Roads of National Significance, and we have been told that oil prices are not even taken into account,” said Green Party Transport spokesperson Gareth Hughes.
So what do they take into account, chicken entrails?
esp since Julie Anne Genter is at number 12 on the preliminary Green list, means she’ll get in if Greens get 9 – 10%.
The short-sightedness of successive governments is not suprising. I highly doubt Labour will win in October, but even if they did, I suspect there would only be token change to government policy or to NZTA policy in the short term. Clearly there are so many factors pointing towards increased funding for PT, but they are being mostly ignored by anyone save the “crazy” Greens. What you need is three successive terms with the political will to bring about change. For that you need the public support to give that mandate, unfortunately in general, kiwi’s are fickle and shortsighted as those that govern. We get the government we deserve.