Locals still opposing Skypath

We have at least 20 years: http://www.nzta.govt.nz/about/media/releases/470/news.html

We need a lot of stuff in the next 20 years before we need a new way to get cars into the CBD.

http://greaterakl.wpengine.com/2012/12/30/ccfas-and-the-additional-harbour-crossing/

How much further will the driving rate have dropped in 20 years? Maybe by then all we will need is a rail tunnel for trains to teh Shore.

I am sure you dont agree but it appears you are fairly mono-modal in your transport preference – hard to avoid when you have been bombarded by pro-auto dependent propaganda for 50 years. I am assuming for you only recreational cycling is valid and actual travel by cycle is an irrelevancy.

All this talk of inconvenience has got me thinking, that as an individual who doesn’t own a car, it would be terribly inconvenient to have to wait for a new tunnel to be bored under the harbour so that a walking and cycling route can be opened to the North Shore. As has been pointed out before, the material difference between Skypath and some other scheme whereby a bridge lane is re-purposed for cycling has me baffled, so advocacy of one over the other doesn’t seem to address the doomsday scenario of resident inconvenience – or have I missed something?

Phil it looks like you don’t understand the time value of money. Inflation is irrelevant.

This blog is full of experts on urban planning affairs, so anyone qualified feel free to jump in and correct me, but how is road tunnel connected at one end to the CBD not about taking more traffic into the CBD? By your own reasoning car ownership is set to rise, so under this scenario what good is this tunnel to motorists other than to deliver them to wherever the tunnel ends? As for tolling to pay for a tunnel, surely the most effective option is to better utilise the bridge as a busway, rather than spending $5 billion on a route attractive enough to generate $5 billion in tolls, thus justifying itself in an accounting sense. Then again, what do I know? If only there was some kind of blog where experts could elaborate their views on these matters…..

That aside, the more you say the less compelling you become. I’m curious to know exactly what kind of harrowing inconvenience you imagine Skypath will put you through? Because apparently the resulting chaos is enough to suggest a wait of a “few years” and $5 billion is a viable alternative to providing walking and cycling access now. On the plight of Northcote Point residents, my imagination fails me.

But Phil, scrolling up is of little value because your argument is so poorly defined. It initially seemed to revolve around the notion that Skypath would induce a huge demand for parking that would need to be met at Northcote Point (I will note here that you have not addressed my point about commuters using Northcote Point as a Park and Ride, and what this has to do with Skypath).

You address my point about simultaneous success and failure with the following quote:

“There are two likely scenarios. 1. It is successful and therefore a massive burden on the local residents or 2. It is unsuccessful and a massive burden on tax payers and still an irritation to local residents. Frankly I don’t embrace either scenario.”

But you still don’t really elaborate on what this inconvenience is. The use of the phrase “still an irritation to local residents” suggests that the only acceptable number of cyclists is zero, but doesn’t explain why (for example, noise?). Again, to make the point as plain as possible, vehicular congestion is poor line of reasoning, as there are straightforward ways to mitigate this.

You then immediately fall into the same trap as you did in the original post – namely that no-one will use Skypath anyway, so why build it. Of course, being that the case, the argument for locals being inconvenienced seems not to hold any water. Remember when explaining your case, the project cannot simultaneously succeed and fail.

To me, the humorous aspect in all this is that when presented with Skypath, you counter with Waitemata Harbour Tunnel, as if the projects are somehow comparable. If only people would wait for a $5 billion dollar harbour crossing, we wouldn’t need Skypath, and Northcote Point could narrowly avoid complete destruction! Its almost as if you value your inconvenience at greater than $5 billion dollars, making the project seem a bargain by comparison. For all your posturing about exchange rates and the like, the figure still makes this basically the single biggest transport spend in the Auckland region, albeit framed at least partly as gold-plating for Northcote Point residents.

Finally, I very much doubt the number of cars in the CBD is going to grow significantly, simply because there doesn’t seem to exist a very good account of where all these cars might go. The CBD is sufficiently congested at peak times already.

Come on Phil, you don’t want anyone moving to Northcote Point? You’re headed for a disappointment then. A better strategy might be to insist that the local community has a say in how Northcote Point grows..

FYI- Former SMB resident, now Grey Lynn

Phil, the skypath will almost certainly not decrease the value of your property. In fact it could even cause the value to increase.

http://blogs.crikey.com.au/rooted/2011/05/03/local-bike-paths-mean-higher-house-prices/

From the article

“The bridge has an estimated capacity of 180,000 vehicles per day, and in 2006 had an average volume of 168,754 vehicles per day (up from 122,000 in 1991).[33]”

Just shy of 326,000. Ironically, the introductory paragraphs also say (end of paragraph 3)

“Many also see the original construction of the bridge without walking, cycling and rail facilities as a big oversight.”

You have no obligation to accept my retraction – what’s said is said and you can take it or leave it. But note the implication here: you would prefer not to use the bridge if my using a bad word is a reflection of the type of patron you expect. A patron that, in Phil’s own words:

“…[will] drop rubbish, piss in the park … make unacceptable noise, park inconsiderately … while they wait angrily for their slot on the bridge? Spare a thought to the local residents … who are at risk of an angry mob on their doorstep and .. rubbish … noise … general inconvenience made.”

You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t appreciate the sentiment here…

Phil plays to his strength – self awareness:

“The assumption that I am anti cyclist is ridiculous and bigoted…”

curiously, that wasn’t the impression I got.

Similarly, who can sympathise with a resident like this? A resident who sees issues like traffic management an unsolvable obstacles that warrent the termination of the project as a whole, rather than solutions to mitigate effects on residents. No-one in all 163 comments has suggested that the project has no impact on locals. Quoting myself

“I’m sure I’m not the only one that can appreciate that residents may be apprehensive about the change … the initial premise here is not entirely unreasonable. 5000 cyclists a day is quite a bit, perhaps the residents are understandably nervous … the problem with your argument Phil, is that it is based on a nightmare scenario where bus loads of tourists and thousands of “arseholes” jam their vehicles into any available space in a small side street so they can drop litter and piss in the park, before making loud and inappropriate noises … well … excuse me for thinking that this does not constitute a reasonable defence on behalf of the residents …”

The galling thing is that all the issues I outline could well be solved to the benefit of all involved. We can manage traffic, we can mitigate impacts on private property, we can adjust routes (within some constraints, obviously) and so on. None of these require the death of the project ipso facto. We can certainly do better than drop $5 billion on a tunnel, to achieve what are as far as I can tell the same outcomes for residents.

I for one, doubt that Phil is at all representative of residents in general, who I assume are mature enough to voice their reasonable concerns like adults. But if you would oppose Skypath because an internet troll like myself would use an unflattering word to describe another internet troll, then I put it to you that your opposition is as shallow and ill-advised as Phil’s.

Sorry Phil but you do yourself a disservice again, with which I must disagree.

If your issue is with entry and exit points, then why was your opening gambit

“Skypath is a selfish wish of a few echo warrior cyclists that will… cause no end of headaches and misery to the residents of Northcote Point, SMB and users of Westhaven Marina.”

You see, as a resident you have every right to question issues like entry points. Indeed criticism of this kind should be welcomed so that all stakeholders can arrive at some reasonable compromise. Why then has it taken you 2 days and 50 or so comments to amend what could only be described as a mouth frothing rant into what seems on the surface to be fairly reasonable disagreement with the proposal?

My abuse was uncalled for, and on that matter I direct you to my retraction. But I will counter your defence of being an internet troll by simply asking you to review your previous contributions to this thread. You will note that for (at a glance) 50 comments you have been met with derision for both factual error, bad faith, and misdirection (Jill notwithstanding, obviously).

I still disagree with you on parking issues, and with your general contempt for the public (you still seem to think that Skypath will as a matter of fact attract undesirable people to the area – a claim that I find strangely paranoid), primarily because neither of these are impossible problems. To date you’ve postured them as insurmountable – I put it to you a compromise can be found.

If you are willing to accept my retraction, then I am willing to have a discussion, but do note that most of my specific criticisms of your argument have gone un-addressed.

Phil your calculation of a $4 toll is all thats needed to pay for a new crossing neglects the fact that a fair chunk of the $4 per car you collect will be eaten up with collection costs, one way or another – even if collected electronically, there is still all that infrastructure needed for collecting the money “after the fact” of the car/truck whatever driving past the toll collection point.
Costs such as enforcement of those who do not pay – if you don’t do this the toll system will fall on its face in short order if it can’t be enforced as no one will pay the tolls an keep driving past.

So, to get $4 per car Toll “netted” of all collection costs, will require a toll of closer to $10 per car. Which is what NZTA estimated would be needed, except I think they wanted it each way, not one way as you propose.

At that Toll rate, the fall off in traffic from your predicted 158K vehicles a day will be quite dramatic as it means PT alternatives become even more attractive (and heaven forbid), also makes the SkyPath toll even more of an attractive option for North Shore residents who don’t want to pay the toll. So then the amount of $ collected will drop, but the collection costs won’t, so the recovery rate (amount of nett money left to service the loan from the tolls), will drop even further.

Oh, and by the way, as it seems you truly want to preserve your way of life – have you that you considered all the changes the UP will bring to your neck of the woods – you may find that the unruly folks who can meander through your suburbs, can, under the UP move into your neighbours place, as under the UP he will be able to carve up his large house into lots of multi-occupant flats, and rent them out as such – effectively turning his multi-million dollar family mansion into a de-facto apartment block.
And if doesn’t the property developer who buys his place from him, probably will.

So all those unruly people you’re concerned about – well yes, they may just be pissing on your lawn as you fear – but it may well be coming from the neighbours upstairs balcony not the road. As they play their loud music and fight and squabble to all hours right outside your windows.

This is a fair point. Being a resident he does have an obvious interest in the area that I and others that live elsewhere don’t, and at no point have I sought to deny this. So let me take this opportunity to both answer your question, and outline in more detail where I stand in the debate.

Firstly, my beef with Phil is in the particular rather than the general. In fact, I daresay that had Phil’s entry into this thread not been filled with such egregious inconsistency and communicated with such needless agression I may not have bothered to comment at all.

Where the balance should lie between society and communities within that society is a matter that will always be up for debate, but I don’t think it unreasonable that local communties voices be given additional weight in matters that affect them, even at the expense of the public at large. However I do think that in the case of public projects the onus is on residents to provide a coherent and realistic account of how thier livelihood is being threatened.

Which brings me to the specific point you raised – would I object to a significant change in an area I invested heavily in? Before I answer, I want to make some distinction between opposition in the abstract and opposition in particular. Posing the question generally – if I thought a project in an area was a dis-benefit to me, or indeed the area as a whole – then quite obviously I would oppose it, as I think would anyone in a similar situation. Posing the objection in this framework makes it easy to conceptualise Phil’s disagreement.

I make this distinction, because I don’t think an abstract framework is a very useful one. It’s a bit like saying would you object to something you object to – presumably yes. Similarly I can sympathise with Phil’s view in the abstract – that that a significant change in the area may compromise his way of life, but I also think that this is not in an of itself a justification against (or indeed for) a project. Indeed, I think the how component of the change is essentially where the merit lies.

(Of course, the merits of the project as a project are also a component here, which is basically why the AWHC fails as an alternative – it just doesn’t serve a useful purpose given the constraints and context irrespective of residents views. )

In other words, is there a Skypath or similar that Phil would support? Obviously the tunnel came up, but myself and others don’t see this as a reasonable alternative, so the question is what can be done to address the residents concerns? If there is a specific complaint (for example, say a house needed to be demolished) then without question this should be weighed against public intrest. But if the answer is nothing, and the locals oppose Skypath simply because, then should that carry the same weight as a specific argument? Should the interest of other stakeholders (in this specific case, potential users who live in other areas) be weighed against “I don’t care for it”?

This is essentially the basis for my disagreement. Phil has come out with a list of things about the project that he dislikes, and in my humble opinion, I think none of them carry enough weight, even with local preference given, to give cause to terminate the project. To use an example, it’s a bit like High Street shop owners who disapprove of pedestrianisation. They are affected directly by the change, and as “residents” they have the right to oppose should they choose to. But if the opposition is about how customer levels will plummet in a post-parking apocalypse, then I would suggest the argument doesn’t provide a coherent account of how that would be, and is thus of little value as an objection. To me the notion that residents should be able to veto public works by the mere fact of being residents is to discard the voices of all other stakeholders – essentially, this gives preference to the mere taste of those who happen to be there.

Now, you may say “Aha, but what about arguments of character? Surely this view precludes heritage concerns and the like?”. In my view, character concerns are essentially excercises in community buy-in. In other words, can you convince other stakeholders that the character value alone is enough to outweigh other concerns? Now, this isn’t really true in the sort of vox-populi sense that heritage societies need to have a private army of prosletyzers to convince naysayers day and night, and so its not really comparable to the Skypath situation. But we codify certain (heritage) protections in law, presumably because we collectively decide that certain things are worth maintaining for their inherent value, be it because they form a part of our collective history, because they reflect our culture, because they define the landscape, ambience, and tone, and so on. If the material affects on a region extend only to character concerns, then it’s my opinion that interested parties should be looking to convince people that those are in fact valid concerns, and that these concerns outweight other matters. (For example, in the case of the port expansion, the community as a whole seemed to agree that the affect on the harbour changed the character of the city sufficiently to outweigh the commercial intrests of PoA).

So let me apply this exposition to my role in the debate. One initial criticism was that Skypath would encourage renegade parking and mass tour buses which would inconvenience residents. I put it to Phil that traffic management could alleviate this problem, but apparently this is a rediculous idea. Needless to say, I wasn’t convinced.

The argument that quality of life in the area will be reduced is hinged on the idea that Skypath promotes anti-social behaviour, and that cyclists and walkers are taken to abuse locals, defecate in parks, a make loud noises as they pass by. I called this out as an uncharitable and paranoid slur on anyone who would use the facility, as well as being both unreasonable (ie: we should never do anything lest 10% of people ruin it) and unrealistic. Phil to date has stood by this view. Again, not convinced.

What about arguments involving the character and ambience of Northcote Point? I’m yet to buy into the idea that Skypath is the character assassination its made out to be, primarly because in my mind the nearby harbour bridge with its 8 lanes of traffic undermines the idea of bucolic side street on the precipice of an urban wake-up call. Having not been to the area and experienced it first hand, it is possible I’ve missed a trick, but again, no resident has given me what I would consider a satisfactory account of the character changes Skypath would bring to the area, so (for me at least) no dice there.

As proper as it might be for Phil’s opinion to carry more weight than mine, the basic arguments are either ill-defined, obfuscated, or false, and the unwillingness to look at mitigation options that could address residents concerns about noise and traffic, coupled with concern trolling about supporting a cycleway as long as it meets some impossibly difficult constraint leave me with the impression that Phil’s opposition stems from his perception that Skypath is an existential threat to himself as a person.

On the other side of the coin is any Aucklander who supports this project, people who would cycle or walk to the CBD rather than drive, arguments for balance away from private cars, and high-level strategic aims to promote walking and cycling in the Auckland region. Even with residents preference, there seems no compelling opposition that couldn’t be handled with the deft hand of compromise, be it traffic management, route changes, signage, or just engaging with the community directly, and to me this is a sign that the project should progress to the next phase so that these details can be worked through.

So here it is – the crux of my argument: When evaluating public works, the important thing is not “would I oppose something like this if built near me”, a value judgement based mainly on how the individual views the merits of the work or the magnitude of the affect, but rather “Should this (public) project go ahead, given all relevant contextual factors including but not limited to time, location, purpose, material and character impacts, weighed against both those directly and immediately affected, and those who stand to benefit (or pehaps lose) both directly and indirectly, applied reasonably to the specific criticisms raised that pertain to the situation of that project, and what, if any, mitigating factors should be applied to reach a satisfactory compromise between these two tensions?”. Every wide-reaching public affair is a balancing act between opposing views, and I don’t feel that “what would I do?” hypotheticals gain us any insight unless furnished with contexual elements from affected parties.

It is in this framework that I don’t feel a rezoning of a rural road in Christchurch, or Transpower erecting high-tension lines in Waikato is comparable to adding a cycleway to the harbour bridge, simply because the interplay between the residents, the public, and the project is different in each case. None if which is to say that those affected should be denied a voice, perhaps even a louder one than others. But even if Phil is doing nothing different to someone having thier house destroyed by a road, does that automatically mean the two situations are comparable? In concrete terms, is Phil’s objection to Skypath as valid as Bob Scott’s objection to Purford, and if so, why (or why not)?

Similarly, I’m going to dodge the original question somewhat (about would I oppose something if it were me), and say that any opposition (or support) that I express for projects in my area (or elsewhere) should be evaluated on thier own merits in each instance, by taking into account the relevant contextual information, and the both the quality and community support of the argument itself, and I hope that it is on this basis that people choose to agree or disagree with my views on Skypath.

Perhaps this means that I don’t really understand how the spheres of society, community, neighborhood, runanga, and iwi intersect (in which case I welcome further discussion), but I certainly don’t feel that Phil’s position (or indeed, any residents position in this thread), even in light of his status as a resident, is strong enough to warrant a wholesale termination of Skypath, and that this is a product of the quality of his argument rather than a reflection of how residents rights should be viewed in general.

As ever, I await Phil’s response.

Aucklanders also managed to do without electricity for 80 years. DAMN KIDS GET OFF MY LAWN AND STOP PISSING ON IT!

I genuinely don’t get this. The implication is that Ponsonby is full of people who enjoy fisting, but in order for this to work as a joke there has to be some kind of reference to the character of Ponsonby residents to play on. A haphazard attempt at a non-sequitur perhaps?

Save the MAMILS:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/11/mamil-middle-aged-men-in-lycra

http://www.brw.com.au/p/business/mamils_you_should_like_those_lycra_932DB83l2JxlHMVQ03eAwO

Never quite understood the hate directed my way because I am a middle-aged male and cycle. Not usually decked out head to toe in Lycra, but like anybody cycling more than 20-30km, the benefits of padded cycling shorts are pretty obvious (even to Phil as he claims to mountain bike). Even on occasional long rides, I wear bright lycra cycle tops in the faint hope that car drivers might actually notice me (and my usual gym tee-shirts don’t tend to come with handy pockets on the back for food).

I am sure the lycra is some sort of fashion crime to hipsters, but the fear and loathing exhibited by people raving on about guys wearing lycra is weird. I have seen plenty of messages on TM (hopefully just from trolls) with drivers threatening to run over cyclists presumably because it is some sort of affront to their masculinity.

I mean, if I was wearing black gumboots, black jeans and black hoodie, it would be OK for me to cycle? Pretty stupid I would think.