A couple of articles in the herald caught my attention this morning that I thought needed some extra comment.
The first was this piece about people clogging up city fringe suburbs for parking.
Inner-city residents appeal to council to stop selfish park-and-ride behaviour.
Residents of central Auckland fringe suburbs such as Mt Eden, Parnell and Orakei are getting riled at their streets becoming free parking lots for commuters skimping on bus or rail fares.
Mt Eden resident Diane Morton says her previously quiet cul-de-sac near a busy bus route has become a mecca for students parking there for long hours each weekday, leaving little room for her and her neighbours to squeeze back in if they return home before late in the afternoon.
Commuters are increasingly driving cars to streets within a $1.90, one-stage bus or rail trip to the CBD, and clogging up suburbs from Freemans Bay to Orakei, from where trains take just eight minutes to reach Britomart.
People driving to the inner city suburbs just so they can get cheaper PT fares is certainly an issue and it creates two key by products. First it obviously clogs up local streets with cars making things difficult for residents but it also generates more traffic as people battle to get to these free parking spaces. However these by products are really just the symptoms of the real problem which is that the parking on these areas isn’t being managed properly. This isn’t the first time we have heard about issues with parking in a city fringe suburb and the first thing that sprung to mind as I read this was that these areas to have a version of the parking scheme currently being trialled in St Marys Bay which has seen area wide time limits imposed but for which residents are able to purchase permits that are exempt. The article continues:
Mrs Morton said she was often forced to park across her own Bourne St driveway when bringing grandchildren to her home. Her garage was too rundown to store her car and she did not want to turn her front-yard vegetable garden into a parking lot.
She believed Auckland Council planners were failing to taking parking demand into account in their urban intensification plans.
She had distributed leaflets to her neighbours asking what they thought could be done. She wanted some form of parking priority, although she disagreed with a $70 charge imposed on St Marys Bay householders in a trial scheme which Auckland Transport hopes may become a model for other fringe suburbs.
Right, so unlike some she actually has off street parking but doesn’t want to pay to fix it up so parks on the street instead. She also doesn’t think she should have to pay for on street parking but wants to be given priority to this publicly owned and paid for piece of infrastructure. The reason there is so much parking demand in her area is because it is currently free to park there. The trial at St Marys Bay finishes in July so it will be good to see the official results of that however like many things that involve pricing something that is currently free, I suspect that most residents didn’t really see the benefits of it until it actually happened. It is likely that the same thing would happen if implemented in other suburbs, people will initially complain but once they see the results won’t want to change back.
Of course local body politicians love to get involved in these types of issues. Christine Fletcher makes the point that Auckland Transport need to be given a chance to assess the impacts on St Marys Bay first. I feel that Mike Lee on the other hand has missed the mark slightly.
Council transport chairman Mike Lee said parking schemes were just treating symptoms of a wider problem, which he suspected was caused by excessive bus and rail fares.
“Rather than suburb-by-suburb and street-by-street I think we need to take a comprehensive overview of the problem and it seems to me that recent fare increases are acting as market signals,” said Mr Lee, who is also an Auckland Transport board member. “Not only do we have a decline in public transport use overall, but we also have behaviour which seems to be influenced by getting a cheap fare.”
Yes the level of PT fares is an issue but reducing them isn’t going to magically get people to stop parking in these suburbs. As mentioned above the real problem is that it is free to park in these suburbs currently. Only by actually managing the parking will we solve the problem.
The second article talks about people moving to Hamilton for cheaper houses.
Aucklanders are looking as far away as Hamilton to buy homes as more people find themselves squeezed out of their local real estate market.
Hamilton real estate agents say there has been a surge in inquiries about properties in their market where the average house price is $347,406.
Other real estate commentators say some are even choosing to make the 90-minute commute over the Bombay Hills while maintaining their lifestyle in the Waikato.
In Auckland, the average house price is $628,205 but that will not buy much for those wanting more than an apartment or a unit in the inner city suburbs.
The big problem I have with this is that people seem to completely underestimate how much they actually pay for transport. Yes you can buy a cheaper house but that can more than be made up for by considerably more expensive transport costs, especially if you are commuting back to Auckland for work like one of the couples mentioned.
Carl Hooker, 37, and his wife, 32, decided to hunt slightly further afield than Auckland while looking for a bigger home for themselves and their three boys .
For a similar price, they were able to swap their 100-year-old villa on a small section for a three-year-old mansion on 5.786 hectares.
The couple both still work in Auckland, splitting the weekly commute.
Now that sounds like they commute together to Auckland and it is roughly 120km from Hamilton. As an indication the IRD suggest that a mileage rate of 77c per km which could cover costs for fuel, maintenance and other costs like insurance . At that level a round trip from Hamilton to Auckland is likely to cost around $180 a day or around $900 per week. Even if you only came up to Auckland a three days a week you are already looking at over $500. A quick calculation using the loan calculator from one of our major banks shows that repayments of $500 a week could equate pay for a mortgage of over $370,000.
Perhaps this shows that our banks should really start linking in transport costs to their lending credit assessments. If they did those wanting to get lending to live in far away suburbs would certainly get a bit of a shock.
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On the first article I have no doubt that people are parking in these areas to reduce their fare stages. This same phenomenon can be witnessed further out in areas such as around the Great South Road end of Rockfield Road. Here it is people parking from further afield in order to catch the trains or buses. I’m one of these and it’s a result of stations being too far to walk to and no park and ride in these areas so we park as close as we can in the streets further out.
It’s obviously a problem for the locals as evidenced by the introduction of parking 120 minute signs.
I’ve made the ultimate sacrifice to avoid this rubbish by buying a cbd apartment.
see this is why cycle infrastructure would be so good. It would give these people a chance to get to the station without driving. The carrot, to go with the parking stick.
These people are clearly more interested in driving rather than cycling.
If they are happy to leave their car parked in some street with a swarm of other all day parkers they certainly aren’t worried about getting their car broken into or vandalised. So parking their bike at some random location near a train station would be even less of a concern.
@SF Lauren, you seem to have forgotten that most people aren’t happy to ride along a road in lanes shared by 1500kg hunks of metal who don’t give 2 shits if the cyclist dies as long as they get to the next intersection faster.
Exactly – a lot more people would cycle 2-3 kms to a train station if there were Copenhagen style cycle paths on the main arterials. All we need to do is get rid of on street parking on arterials like Manukau Road, Great South Road, Dominion Road etc.
This would let us have a configuration on each side of: footpath, cycle path (mono/bi directional), grass berm, bus lane (full/part time), car lane.
This would be more than possible on most arterials in Auckland in terms of width and would lead to some great results. Have a look at what percenatge of Aucklanders live within 2kms of a train station it is huge especially on the isthmus. A 2km cycle is less than 10 mins (even better on an electric bike)!
The only additional cost would be providing covered parking for bicycles at train stations – which is 1/100 of the cost of car parking.
No sailor boy, that was all taken into account in my previous statement. I was more referring to cycle infrastructure at stations however rather than on-road facilities.
What I suspect however, is that these people are choosing to drive to avoid walking or catching a bus to the train station. It just seems strange to me for some to drive from one station to another to reduce their train fair.
If I’m right that will reaffirm my fear that if we don’t make express bus routes right to the city but enforce transfers like the plan is for AMETI that we will get more people driving. Even if only part of the way.
Given that the current option on AMETIis to drive to Panmure, or to catch an express that goes 3 times a day, I doubt the transfer will be an issue. Plus if we actually have a transport system set up for transfers, then transfers will be easier and more popular.
Well that is interesting sailor boy. I just checked now and there will be a bus leaving in 6mins that would take me from the pakuranga town centre directly to britomart without a transfer.
If as you claim only 3 buses make such a trip a day I’m damn lucky to have found one with such a shirt wait in the middle of the day.
Regarding transfers, how is this going to become so much easier to change people’s ways? Other than only needing one ticket the transfer process will remain fundamentally the same being equally frustrating and disruptive.
I said express buses as what you had said implied either an express or RTN service.
And probably in the same way that the tube in London does, or the buses in Vancouver. By making services frequent enough that waiting time overall is reduced compared to catching a single service.
That bus you reported goes what, once an hour? Giving an average wait of 30 minutes. An FSN and then the rali would have an average wait time of 12.5 minutes. You wouldn’t have to check the timetable before you left. You might even catch PT.
You could look at the parking issue as an efficient use of an under utilised resource (residential road space during working hours).
I agree. I’m not completely sure why residents think they have any more right to access public parking than any other person who drives a car?
+1 (both SDW and Stu)
I think you will find these people chose to live on a quiet side street for a reason, and having the road turning into a busy park n ride station was not part of it.
they made a poor choice then.
Thats a pretty cool thing to say. I guess if they ever invoke the civil works act to buy your house if or when you own one you will be chuffed to have it taken off you even if it had been in your family for 3 generations.
And what’s the bet those people complaining are happy to drive to someone else’s side street and park when the need arises.
All for one, one for all.
@SFLauren, that is slightly different. One is people living in an area where it is obvious that non-residents will park.
One is the government springing a project on you, you couldn’t predict it.
Yes sailor boy, slightly different but pretty much the same.
I don’t see how it was meant to be obvious that swarms of people would park on these local roads as a form of park n ride. I certainly wouldn’t do such a thing.
That is because you probably aren’t in a situation where it is an advantage. Or like me you hate driving. Or just have a reason that many members of the public don’t .
Its a public resource so needs to be managed. AT have stuffed up the management and need to do something, whatever it is, but they could have forseen this.
Whenever I’m heading into the central city from Mangere, I do it. It’s quick, cheap, and convenient.
There are regular and efficient buses to the city from Mt Eden, and the single stage is affordable. Taking a bus the whole way would cost significantly more, even including depreciation and running costs for the vehicle I use. It would take a great deal longer door to destination – which is the only measurement worth talking about – at least an hour and a half, instead of 35 minutes. And it would mean planning my life around timetables.
The train could be an option, but given the need to drive to a station and then park, I might as well circumvent the whole process. Recent increases in rail fares make this option even less likely.
The IRD’s figures always seem to overstate things. I don’t think Hamilton is a very sensible solution for this person, for many reasons. If we count his time, then it becomes even more uneconomic. However, it’s hard to imagine that his commute costs $40,000 per year.
why is it unrealistic to suggest that the commuting cost is $40k per year? It’s important to note that very few people make that commute right now despite higher wages in Auckland, which would in turn suggest that the generalised cost of travel is very high.
The IRD’s figures are also only to be used for vehicle travel up to 5,000 km a year. In line with AA figures and the like, they include not just petrol/ tyres and so on, but also allow for depreciation, insurance, etc. Once you’ve covered those fixed costs, your operating costs tend to be a fair bit lower. In the AA figures at http://www.aa.co.nz/assets/motoring/pdf/safety-ratings/2012-Petrol-Running-Costs.pdf, for example, “fixed costs” account for more than half the total cost per kilometre. They estimate the “running costs” at 20 to 30 cents per kilometre, depending on vehicle size.
So those travel costs would be higher than actuals, but even so it’s a very expensive (not to mention time consuming) thing to travel to Hamilton and back all the time.
What if you could catch the train from Mangere and it went every 10 minutes or less?
Would that change your mind?
In London they have Residents’ Parking zones all around the areas people live in. I think residents’ cars have to display their pass, and other cars pay & display or get towed.
Many real cities do it, shame we have so many BANANAs here.
Wellington has had residents’ parking zones for years, and coupons are needed for longer-stay (over 2 hours, I think) parking in inner areas that are not reserved for residents. Both schemes seem to work pretty well.
I don’t think residents parking zones are the solution at all. The ultimate outcome of such schemes is absurd – it’s free to park your own car outside your house, but you’re not allowed to drive anywhere in the city. Price it and be done with it I say.
The St Mary’s Bay one is priced which is why I’m not so opposed to it, not at a huge amount but it is priced.
I don’t think that is a reasonable “price” for a car-park; I suspect it does not even cover the costs of administering the scheme. If AT is going to “lease” on-street car-parks to private individuals, then I’d suggest that the annual price should be somewhere in the order of approximately $2,000 p.a. – or even more where demand is high.
That’s about what one would pay for 10 months of unlimited PT usage (monthly Discovery Pass).
The council could gouge residents for that kind of money, but why? There’s not a lot of alternative use for the parks other than parking. Maybe you could put in some useless landscaping, or sell it off for tiny houses. Other than that, what else is that space good for?
Bear in mind residents are competing for parks with short-stay visitors, who pay nothing at all. So I think the charge should be on the same system as parking meters – only just high enough to make sure occupancy averages below 90%. That price is probably well below $2,000 pa, which is close to what you’d pay for a permanent park in a multi-storey structure in the CBD. If the parks are only just filling up at a price of “free”, the St Mary’s Bay example shows us that you don’t need to charge much to keep occupancy low.
If parking demand keeps rising, the price will go up, and that’s unavoidable. But it’s no reason to extract a monopoly profit just because you can.
(Disclosure: I live in an inner suburb and park on the street)
Just manage demand with timed limits, pay and display, and enforcement. It’s a public resource.
They should charge that much for it because there’s a lot of demand for a scarce resource.
The solution is simple (when you ignore political/cultural dimension): Remove any and all restrictions, implement pay and display (or phone and pay), and if anyone wants a car-park permit for a year charge them market rates (which I accept may be lower than $2k per year in some places). But we are talking about the city fringe here; I’m sure many people would pay $2k for a car-park. That’s only $6 per day.
Adding the political/cultural dimension just means stepping more slowly/carefully towards the same eventual outcome.
Patrick – Wellington’s Coupon Parking scheme is a combination of those things. Free for two hours, or $7.50 for a coupon for a whole working day. There’s a slight discount for a monthly pass ($120), and a huge discount for a prepaid annual pass for residents (which I don’t think is entirely fair – if it’s a bulk discount, everyone should get it).
The system is a good middle ground though – it’s not completely free parking, it doesn’t apply a strict time limit that makes it impossible for residents to park at all, and it doesn’t need nearly as much enforcement as a parking meter system. It can be enforced with just two warden visits per day.
I actuially like Stu’s idea quite a bit, the troubleis that St Mary’s bay is well under 90% at the moment, we need to do all of the fringe suburbs to see any results.
Fixing PT will obviously help too.So hopefully the local residents can figure that out and ask for better PT.
Stu –
While you probably could charge a lot of residents $2k/year for a park because they have no other option, that’s only because the council has close to a monopoly on parking. The only real competition is off-street parking spaces, which in a residential area means paying tens of thousands up front for decades worth of parking. It’s also not even an option for many houses, given the strict heritage controls.
So I think the price should be the clearing price, not the market (profit-maximising) price. That clearing price is probably well under $2k/year. At that price, commuters wouldn’t use it, since they could spent as much and park in the CBD itself.
I don’t think councils should be out to make a profit. If there’s a better use for the space than parking, by all means it should be used for something else. But if the space is used for parking it should be as widely available as possible. For now, most streets aren’t full, and until they are there’s no reason to charge for parking in them.
In the long run, I think you’re right, though. Eventually the council is going to need to charge for parking everywhere just to keep some spaces available, and if that means $6/day or even $100/hour, so be it.
Hi Steve, sounds like we’re converging on a consensus of some form. Just wanted to clarify a couple of points:
1. Does council have a monopoly on parking? I would have thought that even in relatively dense/historic areas the amount of private controlled off-street parking would exceed the amount of council-controlled on-street parking. So I don’t think it’s a monopoly. As an aside, the ability for council to exert market power in this instance depends a lot on the elasticity of demand, which is in turn influenced by substitutes. In this case, I would have though the relative proximity to carshare would place some limit on the prices that could be charged. And that does not mean people necessarily need to get rid of their cars – they could just store them at a friend’s place, join car share for unplanned trips during the week, and go pick up their own car when they need it on weekends.
2. Clearing price versus profit maximising price – yes completely agree with you here; should have been more careful with my terminology.
1. What are your options going to be if you want to own a car and don’t have already off-street parking?
There’s pretty much no commercial off-street parking at the moment, since on-street parking is still free. Under the imminent Unitary Plan, in the ‘centres’ zones, and the city fringe parking overlay, commercial long-stay carparking will be non-complying. No luck there.
The UP also makes the heritage restrictions about building off-street parking even stricter, and the parking maximums mean people who already have private off-street parking usually won’t be able to expand it. It will also (AFAICT) become non-complying even to resell your existing off-street parks. Of course, you’d get away with it if you kept your trap shut. But regardless, most people have off-street parking because they want it for their own cars. For enough money, they might get rid of their own cars to make cash selling their driveway, but I’d think the current owners of off-street parking spaces probably have a higher ability to pay than people who currently don’t own an off-street parking space. Except for a lucky few who have a nearby friend with a spare driveway, you can rule out paying to rent a private off-street parking space.
Some people can build their own off-street parking. But that’s not an option for renters, of course, and even for owners, getting resource consent is far from guaranteed if you live in a heritage area (aka the entire inner suburbs).
So for lots of people, the council is a monopoly – park on the street or don’t park at all.
Of course, the price is limited by substitutes. This is true for any monopoly, which is why the profit-maximising price isn’t infinity – demand curves downward. The substitutes are basically:
A. Don’t own a car
B. Store the car far, far away from your house. Which is pretty much equivalent to not owning a car, unless you’re going on a long road trip, or travelling out to the very worst, most distant pockets of auto-dependency.
The best way to make the price of parking less of an issue is to make not owning a car more appealing. This means better PT, better walking and cycling provision, more services closer to where people live, better delivery services, more widespread carshare, and (for those road trips) rental car companies that aren’t a pack of crooks.
After all, the whole point of a price for parking is that it keeps going up, until there’s some marginal schmuck who can’t afford to park any more, gives up, and lives without a car. The cost of parking, plus the fixed costs of owning a car, are essentially a dollar value of how much worse that schmuck’s life is now going to be. A lower price is a sign that people think that they aren’t losing out as much by living without a car.
2. Cool. I just think this is an important point, and it’s very similar to road pricing, or user pays for anything else the council provides. The amount the council could make off road pricing is way higher than what they should charge just to get efficient use of the network.
Steve, I think your suggestion that the council has a monopoly on parking is absurd.
People who want parking should make sure they live somewhere that has enough off-street parking for their needs. You know, like we expect people to rent houses that have enough bedrooms and bathrooms to suit their preferences.
In the unfortunate situation that people find themselves living somewhere without off-street parking then they can rent from their neighbours, as already happens in many central suburbs.
Parking does not even fit a loose description of monopoly.
Most houses available for rent in the inner suburbs don’t have off-street parking, and landlords aren’t going to just go out and build it for their tenants. As I said, there’s no possibility of commercial parking, and parking maximums and heritage restrictions will mean that the prospect for any more private off-street parking in the future is limited. There will be a few people with spare driveways to rent out, but that’s a pretty small volume compared to the total demand. As long as most households have at least one car, there aren’t enough houses with off-street parking for all of them. The large number of left-overs, whoever they are, depend on the council for on-street parking.
(Outside the inner suburbs, obviously there’s tons of free parking for everyone, so the whole issue is moot.)
Maybe “monopoly” might be overstating it. The council has a pretty dominant position in the parking business, and they make the rules that prevent much competing parking being built.
I’m not trying to make some sort of moral argument here, about who “deserves” parking, or whether the council’s somewhere-less-than-monopoly on parking is a good or bad thing. Other than disabled parks and loading zones, I don’t think the council is obliged to make sure there’s parking available at all. But since it does provide a whole bunch of parking, with pretty much no alternative use for the space, it should only be restricted or priced enough to make sure that everyone has the chance to use it.
In short, I agree with your logic here – http://greaterakl.wpengine.com/2013/05/16/why-road-pricing-is-not-a-revenue-raising-measure-and-it-is-not-necessarily-inequitable/ – but I’m applying it to cars that are stopped, rather than moving. And yes, parking revenues (and fines) should be earmarked for public transport.
And yes, I think visitors should even get a discount compared to residents, since they have no option at all to use off-street parking.
Don’t see this as a huge problem and I live in a fringe suburb where people park and ride.
Its a better problem to have than people parking for free in the CBD/ and or driving in etc.
It is an inconsistent logic though, and I hate inconsistent logic. An easily confused person you see.
To clarify, I’m inclned to agree with SDW. What would we do with all those unnecessarily wide residential streets during the middle of the day if noone was parked in them?
It is noticeable at Three Kings that people are driving there, parking on the street and then taking the bus via Mount Eden Road. Ironically TK has a massive car park that is virtually empty 360 days a year – it’s 5 minute walk from the bus terminus, but not visible from the street.
Cost might be part of the equation, but convenience is also a factor. I hate the Three Kings bus service (see my post on bus services yesterday). I started driving to the Onehunga train station, and using the park and ride. It was more expensive than the bus fare from TK, but a nicer commute (see my bus post yesterday re service predictablity and weather protection).
I’ve since started driving to Kingsland and catching the train from there, as trains run every 15 mins, as opposed to 30 mins on the Onehunga line. I’m also driving in the right direction so the train journey time is shorter, and catching the train from Kingsland is cheaper – but that wasn’t a factor in my decision. Conscious of residents’ needs for parking, I checked out the street parking both on weekdays and weekends prior to using it, and the Eden Park side of the street does not appear to be used by residents. What annoys me is there is parking within Eden Park that is not in use most weekdays – a ready made park and ride.
Would I take a bike to the station? Hell no in winter; maybe in summer I’ll try it but that means packing a full set of work clothes into a backpack, and we have no shower facilities at work.
I was just wondering how far your ride to the station is? To beat my own little drum, have you considered an electric bike? I cycle 3kms to the ferry every day and work an office job. With an electric bike, even with hills, I dpont break a sweat and I definitely dont need to shower at the office.
Decent electric bike is around $1,500.
It is a market failure.
How?
Private benefit of a public resource is not priced, ie street parking, so it distorts behaviour. Price that resource and behaviour will change. After much gnashing of teeth.
strictly it’s not a market failure because no market existed in the first place. What we have is a failure of public agencies to provide appropriate price signals to ensure a somewhat efficient allocation of an (allegedly) scarce resource. That to me belongs in the (rather large) category of “tragedies of the unpriced commons”.
Stu I think you are mincing words on this. Markets are merely systems of exchange, and currently the council system of exchange is a turd in which the appropriate citizens have no means to negotiate. Pretty simple innit?
Although, if the council permit no exchange to occur, then it isn’t a system of exchange is it? I get you…
Perhaps we should call this ‘Social Justice’.
Ahhh, if using words appropriately is “mincing” then consider me guilty as charged. More seriously, I was just pointing out that “market failure” is a specific term used to describe situations “when the allocation of goods and services by a free market is not efficient” (Wikipedia).
Council’s current management of on-street parking does not IMO qualify as a “market failure” because on-street parking is not a free market (although unlike Steve, I don’t think it’s anywhere close to a monopoly).
I think what you are trying to imply (correctly) is that the council has failed to recognise the benefits of market price signals, which can “clear” the market (as Steve noted above).
This is a problem at the edge of PT fare zones, where there will always be high demand at the edge of the zones. Perhaps zone edges should be in locations with plenty of parking. In Melbourne there are only 2 zones, and at the boundary are stations such as Laverton that has become a massive park-and-ride, and during weekdays over 1000 cars park on the station car park and adjacent residential streets. In Melbourne’s case there is a clear operating cost rationale for the inner zone, because it co-incides with the limit of short services on the train lines. A single train and driver on a short service can fit 2 return trips into a 2-hour peak period, carrying twice as many passengers within the peak as a long service into the outer suburbs where only a single service can be undertaken within the peak. Smaller fare zones have an intrinsic “fairness” for short distance travellers, but are often unrelated to the operating costs of providing the service.
Agree
Getting the best of both worlds. Often PT from outer suburbs is slow and infrequent. Perhaps AT should build some inner suburbs park and ride lots to solve the problem. Lots of other cities cater for this market so should Auckland.
Hear hear!
disagree. Inner city park and ride is not the answer.
More frequent routes is the answer, plus a PT fare structure that does not create so many arbitrary fare boundaries. Both solutions are ultimately cheaper and more effective than inner-city P&R, which ultimately will just contribute to congestion in Auckland’s (rapidly expanding) city fringe areas.
And frequent routes in bus lanes to make the bus quicker than a car.
All that e do with park and rides is shift the problems of autpoia into the fringe.
Park and Rides only belong at the very end station of the line, so that visitors from rural areas can get to the city. This means Auckland should have a grand total of four park and rides: Albany, Swanson, Papakura, and Pukekohe. They can move farther out as the city and rapid transit network expand.
All the others should be sold to the highest bidder for development, which is going to be a much better use of space.
We agree again. In terms of moving further out, I would suggest:
1. P&R functions at Albany gradually shift north to Silverdale;
2. P&R at Papakura gradually shifts south to the new Drury station; and
3. P&R in the vicinity of Westgate supports bus-based PT in Upper Harbour area.
Completely agree, P&R in suburbs kills me. Such a waste of space.
We could use the entire park and ride budget on bus stops and interchanges on the new FSN, get better results and not have hideous carparks next to train stations.
I also think that we may need a park and ride at Botany at some stage though…..
Well, does this mean you are against having park and ride at the proposed new PT interchange hubs ?
A big part of the problem is that everyone loves frequent (and if possible also fast/rapid) PT and so will often DRIVE to where they can connect onto it. We saw this when the GWRC proposed implementing the Jarrett Walker inspired hubbing model as the core of its Wellington City Bus Review. As many as 30% at one hub would have to change buses where they currently get into the CBD on a through bus. Over 6,300 submissions were received (more than any other consultation in the history of the GWRC) and most the hubbing elements of the revised plan have since been reduced or eliminated.
One important piece of feedback from the public consultation was most PT users did not want to interchange from a low frequency PT service to a high frequency PT service. It became clear that many bus users facing an interchange would instead switch to driving to the hub where more frequent PT services were available. Of course this also wouldn’t work because the GWRC did not budget to provide park and ride to bus hubs and so such commuters would try and park on residential streets near the hubs.
Not only would the current problem of suburban PT commuters driving & parking near PT hubs would get worse but these same hub areas are also targeted for high density housing including having lower levels of off-street parking. It seems the city planning process to improve the PT is in conflict with city planning to have higher density housing near PT hubs.
Failing to follow here?
You are saying that commuters would rather catch a bus from near a train station to the CBD that goes hourly than catch a bus going every 15 minutes to a train station then catching the train running at 10 minute frequencies?
A lot of evidence says otherwise.
No, I am saying that bus commuters who are currently on a direct bus every 30 minutes would rather change to drive to a hub than catch a 30 min frequency bus to the hub even if the hub has more frequent service into town. One reason is because the return journey (frequent service bus to hub then wait for the 30 min return bus) is actually guaranteed to be longer than their current service whereas the busing to the hub and driving home will be shorter than their current service. It just makes logical sense for many people to (try to) switch to driving to a frequent service hub than take a feeder bus service. In these terms, switching to a hub based service creates “winners and losers” where those close to the hub win and those beyond walking distance lose (i.e. get a worse service) compared to the current model of more direct routes.
And the current system doesn’t create winners and losers?
I would say that anyone wanting to go cross town currently is the loser.
Also, chances are that if you were on a 30 minute route before, you are gonna be pretty close to a 15 minute route with the new network.
Also, it is disingenuous to call our bus routes direct, as many are very circuituous.
Hi Tony,
I support P&R provided it’s an efficient use of resources. Unfortunately P&R rarely is efficient in inner-city locations where the cost of land is high and there are relatively large congestion costs. In these places other improvements, such as higher frequencies, are typically more cost-effective,
I can’t comment directly on the Wellington City Bus Review due to my involvement in the project. I can say that 30% of passengers transferring is not uncommon in networks overseas. I’ve worked in Australasian cities where an *average* of 25% of passengers will transfer at least once to complete their journey. The proportion is much higher (up to 60%) in locations where services operate at frequency, have coordinated timetables, and transfers are supported by appropriate infrastructure.
I believe that public consultation is a relatively unreliable way to get feedback on transformative network change. Reason being that the people who stand to benefit, for example from an expanded frequent network, are not aware that they will benefit from the proposed changes and hence do not bother to make a submission. The ones who do bother are, almost without exception, passengers that are negatively affected.
In saying that, Jarrett and I both agree that direct peak services are warranted where there is sufficient numbers of people looking to make a journey who would otherwise have to transfer to reach their destination. That is the approach that we apply almost universally in our work. The trade-off that has to be considered, however, is whether the utilisation of that (valuable) peak service is higher than what would be achieved were it to be reinvested elsewhere in the underlying network; often this is not the case.
Have a lovely day,
Stuart.
I have a lot of respect for the work that Jarrett (and his team) does in Public Transport. I have met him once and found him both approachable and logical.
That said, I simply believe that his model has too much “optimisation” towards hubbing and too higher levels of transfer. As you must be aware, there were other reasons why the public rejected the proposed changes in Wellington including almost zero budget for building proper interchanges, no integrated ticketing and some other agendas we don’t have to go into here.
At the moment I believe about 3% of Wellington commuters interchange and the changes would have lifted this to over 10%. IMO this sort of change is simply to great to do without disrupting too many commuters lives, especially when this approach is not proven in NZ. The real result will more likely be as I outlined with greater park and ride irrespective of the adequacy of parking around PT hubs . . . and residents within walking distance of these PT hubs must expect their streets to be filled with cars every day.
Pretty hard to expect a transfer based system to work without ticket and fare integration and the construction of appropriate physical infrastructure. Clearly transferring is a ‘cost’ and can only be expected to be worth paying in the absence of further disincentives, and in fact in the presence of clear benefits, like an overall shorter journey time or radically improved frequency and route choice.
Yes Jarrett is approachable and logical. And yes we (being his team) do try our best.
In terms of your other comments, we have always maintained that integrated ticketing was an essential component of moving to a connective network.
It is difficult to say what is an “appropriate” level of transfers in a city such as Wellington. As a general rule of thumb, requiring a transfer where there was not one previously can be expected to reduce patronage by circa 30-50%, once the inconvenience and additional waiting time is considered. So if 7% more passengers (i.e. 10% less 3%) have to transfer, then you can expect to lose approximately 2.1-3.5% of patronage.
This loss needs to weighed up against the additional patronage that would be generated by the 1) expanded frequent network; 2) more legible network; and 3) greater inter-peak/evening service levels. I would suggest that the combined impacts of 1) + 2) + 3) would exceed the 3.5% of passengers who were lost, especially in the long run. But I respect the fact that some people, such as yourself, may disagree.
In terms of overseas comparisons, BNE is probably the best example of a system that focuses on avoiding transfers and providing “one seat rides”; frankly BNE’s network is a bit of a mess. In contrast Perth operates a more connective network which I believe is more efficient. Whether this reflects other factors – such as urban form, competitive tendering, and a more efficient/modern rail network – is hard to say.
Thanks for your comments Stu (and Patrick). I would make three more points in response:
* Whether points 1), 2) & 3) have a greater impact depends on what the main PT problem is . . . and the PT problems are very different between Wellington and Auckland. Wellington’s biggest problem is to support the high asymetric peak commuter numbers (I believe our CBD has the highest %employment in Australiasia) and so building a sustainable PT system where over 1/2 the capacity is only used twice per day is the challenge. Therefore interchange on peak services needs to be avoided otherwise the 30 – 50% of those affected are likely to switch back to driving. Auckland seems to have a different challenge of getting people to more dispersed work locations but at least the travel is more symetric.
* Switching to a hub based network DOES require a signficant investment in hub infrastructure. This is a given for the rail network (e.g. Panmure) but rarely done seriously for bus-only hubs.
* I assume you acknowledge my original point being that PT hubs WILL attract park and ride commuters no matter where they located and irrespective of whether their are provided with official park and ride parking. I reiterate that It seems to me that hubbing involves winners and losers. The biggest winners are PT users within walking distance of PT hubs. But there are losers too such as:
– (non-PT user) residents near a PT hub who will be forced to start pay to protect their on street parking
– residents away from PT hubs that have a reduced PT service whose alternative is to drive directly or (try to) park near the nearest hub.
I am not aware that the Auckland Bus Review has produced these numbers from the modelling of the bus review (i.e. numbers who must interchange, numbers expected to park & ride, etc.). I would hope it was published but given AT’s track record with providing me this sort of key data, I am not going to ask 😉
1. Yes, urban structure and nature of PT flows are relevant considerations. Auckland is much better placed (ironic given it’s low density compared to Wellington) to embrace a connective network, because the former has a polycentric nature and geography, which creates chokepoints approximately 30 min from the city centre at New Lynn, Onehunga, Otahuhu, and Panmure. Such locations are perfect connection opportunities.
2. Only sometimes and in some locations do connective networks require “significant” investment in infrastructure. To give you an example, look at the intersection of Geary and McAllister in San Francisco (http://goo.gl/maps/e4eDm). Here, bus stops have been developed close to the stop lines so that passengers can cross. Even developing off line interchanges, such as at Otara in Auckland can be done for $1-2 million.(http://greaterakl.wpengine.com/2012/07/20/upgraded-otara-bus-interchange/). In our experience, incurring some one-off capital costs to allow for connections can result in substantial ongoing operational efficiencies that easily pay back on the investment.
3. I don’t think you can make a broad statement that interchanges in connective networks will necessarily attract demand for P&R. Where such interchanges are located close to low density residential areas that are not well-served by PT then the answer would be “yes”, but even then you still need to answer the question of whether providing (formal) P&R was the best way to manage demand, to which the answer often is “no”.
4. In terms of winners and losers, they are many and varied. Yes people who live close to the intersection of two frequent lines will benefit from expanded PT accessibility. The losers are those who have to connect, although they may also benefit from increased frequency and expanded service levels at off-peak/shoulder times, which would at least partly mitigates the negative impact. You really need to analyse individual journey data to get that level of understanding. But as per my previous point, don’t forget about the new winners who are not currently using PT!
5. Auckland’s New Network (it’s much more than a bus review, IMO) is a work in progress. From what I can tell AT is putting information out in the public domain as quickly as they can (hence the New Network page plus video), but that’s just my perception. I’d suggest you give them some time – they still, after all, are consulting with the public on some of the design aspects.
Newmarket and indeed Britomart itself are interchange stations that clearly do not either attract nor provide PNR. Informal PNR happens all over Auckland in residential streets and other carparks with our currently non-connective network. In fact this phenomenon may well be exacerbated by the point to point nature of the current network as riders have to get to the right bus or train route to get to their destination because of the absence of easy and lower cost transferring. Wharves suffer from PNR over demand, which is unpriced of course.
PNR is best for outer stations serving dispersed populations. Also it is worth mentioning Kiss and Ride, drop offs at stations, is a method of station use that is arguably worth facilitating even more than PNR as it is less land hungry and suits many households that face commutes in multiple directions.
Absolutely agree that Auckland and Wellington are very different. And it is regrettable that for years the MoT have considered Wellington’s city terminus model as the only functioning idea for PT in NZ, perhaps because of an over familiarity with what is considered as the only success system in the country. Of course that requires that the forget what Auckland was like before our extremely successful network was dismantled in the rush to built autopia here.
I completely agree with Stu that our poly-centric city and the natural pinch-points of the physical geography is particularly well suited to the coming connective system and that in this Wellington is no model for Auckland at all. Of course it would be helpful if we were able to spend a greater proportion of our taxes on the required (but not expensive) infrastructure that would facilitate this. Instead the government has decreed that PT work can only have 3% of the new infrastructure budget over the next three years against 97% for new Highways and roads. This is the greater problem, not a likely outbreak of PNRs.
I think you’ve overestimated how much it costs for the Hamilton supercommute. $180 return seems a bit ridiculous. Regardless, if you’re willing to take to bus, Intercity have 14 trips (7 round trips) for $259 which isn’t awful.
https://www.intercity.co.nz/passes/intercity-commuter/
Perhaps. The AA rate allows for annual vehicle depreciation. On the other hand it probably does not allow for someone having to pay for parking.
So it probably over-estimates the cost of commuting from Hamilton to suburban Auckland, but under-estimates the cost of commuting from Hamilton to Auckland city centre.
The AA rate assumes depreciation of more than $3,000 per year, which may be true for a new car but isn’t relevant to most people who buy used cars instead. It’s also irrelevant if you would have owned a car anyway, which is probably going to be true in Hamilton and most parts of Auckland, even if you only need it for non-work trips.
agree.
How would you calculate it then Stu? The cost of car ownership is crucial to a lot of the arguments made on this blog but I’ve never seen anyone put a convincing argument that the AA estimates are that far out.
depends on what you’re trying to measure. The AA estimates are a useful approximation of the average cost of driving a kilometre in New Zealand.
But it’s not always good to use an “average” value for several reasons.
The first is that the cost of driving depends a lot on whether you pay for parking, which depends on where you are driving from/to. Someone who pays for parking at both the start and end of their trip will have a much higher per kilometre rate than people who live in Taihape.
Second, in the presence of fixed costs, such as insurance and (most) depreciation, the average cost is likely to be a poor indication of the marginal costs, more specifically the average costs are way higher than the marginal costs. If we assume that most households in Hamilton will own a car even if they do not drive to Auckland to work, then the marginal costs are just distance-related operating costs, e.g. fuel/maintenance.
I’d suggest marginal costs are usually better than average costs when considering peoples day-to-day travel decisions. In the long run you would expect the average cost to first influence decisions on vehicle ownership and then subsequently influence travel decisions.
Whether the AA rate is high or low is hard to say. I also note that it does not include the value of time, which should be considered separately – and converting that to a per km rate depends on average speed.
Clear as mud?
Cars depreciate in two ways though. Depreciation to do with the age of the vehicle is a fixed cost and if you own a car anyway you can’t avoid it so it shouldn’t be covered. But on the other hand, depreciation also occurs with increasing milelage (not sure if that’s the right spelling). I would consider depreciation to be a semi variable cost in this case, so it’s fair to include some (but not all) depreciation into calculating the cost of a longer commute.
Most cars that you would want to drive from Hamilton to Auckland every day would depreciate by that much. At any rate, if you were driving that far, depreciation would not be your largest bill.
Also, these people are losing at least 3 hours per day driving. That is the real cost and, as Kent notes below, it really is not worth it.
completely agree.
dft7132
AT has park n rides in Victoria St, the Civic etc where you can catch the link bus. Is that what you mean?
Every person that parks in these “free” streets (including my own) is one less car entering the CBD and TWO PT trips every day. Surely that is a huge success? People like the woman quoted in the first story don’t think through the consequences of asking for this in their hood. She could just clean her garage out, she could park across her own driveway, but instead wants free reserved parking! That is selfish of her but the nasty ends of resident parking will crush her. Now she may have to pay to not get a guaranteed park outside her house ($70-$150 per year plus extra for visitor coupons. The “free parkers” will now- what?
Drive into town and clog up the CBD? Not take PT? Park at the park and Rides that don’t exist out where they live? Residents parking scheme are anti PT and an unneeded level of bureaucracy and cost.
Can I say “silly bint” on these boards?
yes, I think P&R is a valid use of on-street parking provided it is (like all parking should be) appropriately managed
The Hamilton super-commuting option reminded me of this classic study at the height of the property bubble in the US (apologies for the long quote):
“This is what economists call “the commuting paradox.” Most people travel long distances with the idea that they’ll accept the burden for something better, be it a house, salary, or school. They presume the trade-off is worth the agony. But studies show that commuters are on average much less satisfied with their lives than noncommuters. A commuter who travels one hour, one way, would have to make 40% more than his current salary to be as fully satisfied with his life as a noncommuter, say economists Bruno S. Frey and Alois Stutzer of the University of Zurich’s Institute for Empirical Research in Economics.”
Too true, Kent. In my experience long-distance commuting is a wealth-destroying and wellbeing-destroying activity. Many words have been expended on agglomeration benefits; these are generally defined as value added per employee and loosely described as increased productivity. From an employee perspective, however, if the increase in income is accompanied by in increase in hours the productivity gains for the individual are less or can be negative. If, like me, you are self-employed, commuting time is time you cannot bill a client for; time that you are spending money and not earning it. The opportunity cost can dwarf car running costs but for me the clincher is the quality of life issue.
I also think that the mode of commute is important. I would take 2 hours on a train over an hour in a car simply because you can actually get stuff done on a train.
I cannot get stuff done on a train that someone will pay me for. Two hours on a train (or car or bus) is two non-productive hours. It’s also 2 sedentary hours that I am not with my family or doing other things that I prefer doing. I suspect that those who mention all the good things they can do while commuting are attempting to rationalise. To paraphrase the paper that Kent references, you wouldn’t choose to sit in a stationary bus/car/train outside your residence to engage in these activities. It’s mitigation at best. I have commuted in 5 different countries and my mantra is the less, the better (your mileage may vary).
You couldnt get anything done a train fully wired with WIFI, your cell phone and nice tables in between the seats like in Europe?
Are you a tradesman? As a lawyer I could almost do my whole days work in that environment.
Wow, remind me not to give you my private documents to flash about on the train….
BUt really, you are overstating the case. Some people can work well in the cramped space they have on even the best PT. Others (most?) find it difficult to get much done beyond a bit of reading or web-browsing. A long commute is a hassle whatever the mode.
“As a lawyer I could almost do my whole days work in that environment”
So…why don’t you? If you don’t need face-to-face contact and there are no agglomeration benefits you might as well work at home 4 days a week at a 0.3 m² desk (replicating your share of one of those “nice” tables) and avoid inflicting your legal phone calls on other commuters. If everyone were able to do most of their work with WIFI, a mobile phone and a table why are we even discussing the mobility aspect (commuting) at all?
Dan – that’s ridiculous – you dont think lawyers work on planes now? I can tell you they do.
MFD – No I wouldnt work from home every day because of the agglomeration benefits I enjoy and the interaction with colleagues – and I would hate to but that is a different matter.
“If everyone were able to do most of their work with WIFI, a mobile phone and a table ” – That is really a straw man argument. We are talking about a 2 hour train journey and I am saying I could get some work done on that train. OK I couldnt do every days work in that environment but I could do some days. Needs must.
I have often travelled by plane and train in Europe and done work as do a lot of the other lawyers I worked with. When I worked in a London investment bank, one of the investment managers travelled two hours every day from Norfolk either way on the train and he told me he used to get a lot of work done.
You often see businessmen in NZ working on their laptop on a plane. A train would be even better as you can have WIFI access easily – it is common on trains in Europe and Asia.
Are you saying you couldnt get any work done on a train in two hours with a laptop, phone and a small table? You couldn’t at least just catch up on your emails or trade articles? Make some calls to clients? As I said, are you a tradesman? Do you need some special tools or working environment for your job?
Currently my ten minute bike ride and 10 minute ferry ride commute doesnt give me any time to work – thankfully.
I’m a dental surgeon.
Ah yes touche – well obviously couldn’t do that on a train. At least, I imagine not very successfully or painlessly!
No, not a dental surgeon at all; just yanking your chain to illustrate that work takes many forms and some of it requires a connection to the physical world. 😉
I am a self-confessed rail enthusiast. I have worked on trains; I have discussed designs with architect clients in the observation car of a train on the Gotthard route in Switzerland, I have worked with colleagues in the cafe car of the Capitol limited between Chicago and DC and on ICE trains in Germany. I have even performed my “duties” in the sleeping car compartment of the “Lunatic Express” between Mombassa and Nairobi while on honeymoon (!) BUT not one of those trips was a commute and work was never done in the confines of a standard seat with a communal or fold-down table. I have attempted to work on a Chiltern Lines DMU to Marylebone but there was scarcely enough room for my knees, let alone opening the laptop.
Commuting typically takes place before normal working hours start and after normal working hour finish so calling clients is not realistic and, from my observations, pisses other passengers off. I typically require a laptop workstation which is big and heavy (by laptop standards) and my desk is typically several square metres to accomodate various reference drawings etc (plus two monitors) ….but the real clincher is I can’t invoice for time spent with this low-productivity work and if I can’t invoice for it I don’t get paid for it. For the majority of wage and salary earners I am confident in stating that their income remains the same whether they work on a train or not. On that basis, what is the value of this work?
In my experience, sleeping is about the best use of commuting time. As I stated earlier, your mileage may vary; literally. In the meantime I will stick to my personal guide of the less commuting the better.
Who said it had to be productive time. I catch the bus into uni. Off peak it takes a little longer than driving. But 40 minutes reading is better than 30 minutes driving.
Or 40 minutes doing calculus assignments, as I did today.
I always peer over lawyers shoulders to look at the juicy details on their computer screen. Lawyers have a habit writing nicely succinct, easily read documents for mass consumption on trains and airplanes.
MFD – if the only point you are trying to make is that commute times should be as short as possible then you are preaching top the choir. When I moved back to AKL recently I did everything I could to make sure my commute was less than 30 minutes. I simply wouldnt take a job that forced me to do more.
I was only refuting your point that it is not possible to do productive work on a train – from my personal expereince (and from your comment actually from your experience as well) it is for most “knowledge” workers.
“I simply wouldn’t take a job that forced me to do more”…quite so.
And yet in another thread you state (in the context of HSR):
“People could live in a smaller city and enjoy all the agglomeration benefits of Auckland – like more competition for jobs and therefore higher salaries” and indicated that it would be “fantastic”?
Not acceptable for you and me but a great way of bestowing Auckland’s bounty on others? Frey and Stutzer say otherwise.
I tend not to trust real estate agent’s opinions, expecially in real estate, and in this case it’s obvious they have an interest to heat up the housing market in Hamilton, since Auckland’s one is already boiled enough.
BUT IF it’s true that people is commuting from Hamilton than a fast (can’t say high speed) rail line could compete quite well. A 20k $ yearly ticket maybe?
There will be the odd Hamilton-Auckland commuter; in fact I know a husband and wife who did it at one point while they were trying to sell their Hamilton house before renting in Auckland; but there are buggerall in the scheme of things.
From page 15 of the following: http://www.stats.govt.nz/~/media/Statistics/browse-categories/people-and-communities/geographic-areas/commuting-patterns-nz/auckland/commuting-patterns-auckland.pdf, there were around 8,000 people who gave their workplace address as being in the Auckland “metropolis” (the four old cities) but lived outside the Auckland region.
This included people who lived much further away than Hamilton and clearly wouldn’t be commuting every day. From page 16, there were 573 people from Hamilton City and 546 from the Waikato District. This suggests that these kinds of commutes are extremely uncommon, and the fact that I know someone who’s done it seems to be a statistical blip.
That was from the 2006 census, and since then living in Auckland has gotten more expensive, but petrol has gotten more expensive too. I doubt there’s been a major shift since then, on the whole.
Doesn’t stop the Herald promoting it as a valuable and popular thing. Same today with driving from Puke, the interviewee mentioned the train, but the pull quote was all about how wonderful driving is. This is a very strange pro sprawl, pro driving commute campaign by the Herald. Is all their readership now elderly and suburban or something?
for sure they get a lot of money from advertising by real estate companies and such, so I guess the Herald has to give something back.
Apartments and other inner city real estate still needs advertising; that doesn’t explain it. Cars ads perhaps…?