What comes first, the CRL or another Harbour Crossing
On Twitter today, North Shore Councillor George Wood asked: Its an interesting question but to me the answer is simple, the CRL. The reason for it comes down to demand. First up lets look at the the harbour bridge, the average number of vehicles crossing the harbour bridge today is less than it was in 2003 and that is showing no signs of changing.…
48 Comments Upgraded Otara bus Interchange
Its not only our train stations that need upgrading but also many of our bus facilities and so it is pleasing to see the completion of the Otara bus interchange. Auckland transport say that the interchange sees over 330 services and nearly 3000 boards per day so it is pretty well used.…
What’s happening to rail patronage?
Matt’s post on the latest patronage figures confirmed something that has been brewing for a while now: rail patronage isn’t growing anymore. Let’s track rail patronage increases for the past while, each time comparing against the patronage of the same month the year before:
Just looking briefly at the graph above it seems as though the Rugby World Cup was a turning point – for the worse.…
Confessions of a transport hitman – Private super-profits or public sector waste?
NZTA’s spending on consultants has been in the news recently; millions of dollars have apparently been spent on investigation and design for the RONs. Some people, such as Gordon Campbell, have suggested the money is being spent on “consulting oligarchs.”
As a consultant myself I find such discussions very interesting.…
June 2012 Patronage report
Auckland transport has released the patronage stats for June. The month is also the end of the financial year for AT so these also represent the stats that will go into the annual report. Here are the highlights from AT: Auckland public transport patronage totalled 71,087,755 passengers for the full 2011/12 financial year to June 2012 an increase of 5,324,100 boardings or +8.1%.…
Guest Post: Bicycles the Incredible Urban Leverage Engine
This is a Guest Post by Kent Lundberg. It originally appeared here and has been reproduced with Kent’s kind permission. Quality Guest Posts are always welcome. One reason I go on about bikes here is that I see them being an incredible opportunity to leverage our existing urban form and provide one of the tools to deal with our current resource realities.…
NZTA use of consultants questioned
Radio NZ broke a story on Monday about the amount of money the NZTA had spend on consultants to look at the Roads of National Significance showing that all up just over $200m had been spent on consultants. Here is the story:
Some $216 million has been spent since 2009 on investigation and design work for five of the seven roads – Puhoi to Wellsford, Auckland’s western ring route, the Waikato expressway, Wellington’s northern corridor and Christchurch motorways.…
An Unnecessary Battle
It seems that the NZ Herald is determined to undermine support for the City Rail Link, although Auckland Transport also seem to be doing a good job of that too. How so? Well let’s explain.
Here’s the story on the front page of today’s Herald:
Their new dream home – right in the path of rail project
Excited homeowners moving into a new $10.5 million apartment block have been told it may be demolished for Auckland’s rail-loop project.…
How to cover Auckland’s (supposed) transport funding gap?
The Council issued a press release today highlighting that it’s shifting to the next phase of analysing ways in which to bridge the $10-15 billion funding gap between the projects that are (supposedly) required over the next 30 years and the amount of money available under traditional funding schemes.…
Priority of Packed Trains vs Cars at Level Crossings
This post is a little bit of a rant about something that has been annoying me. Recently a change was made to how city bound trains operate through New Lynn which has resulted in dwell times being considerably slowed down. In the past trains would turn up at the platform, train staff would go though their normal procedure and then the train would depart.…
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