This is a guest post from Michael Dickens
The concept of Wellington’s Transmission Gully Road and a Petone to Grenada Link Road has been around for decades.
Suddenly though we’re blindsided by major new motorway options ‘tacked on’ with haste to the proposed Petone to Grenada Link Road (P2G) in February this year.
These new options (one includes the destruction of a whole rural valley – option D) have appeared with no public planning, and were a surprise to the Wellington City Council which questions why they’re needed?!
Option D will be an unnecessary 4 lane motorway through the beautiful rural Takapu valley (option D), a unique gem within Wellington City District, as a preferred option over widening 3km of existing SH1 (option C) between Grenada North and the start of Transmission Gully. ‘It is easier than having to consider traffic management’ NZTA tell us.
Incredible in this day and age is the concept that weighs equally the short term gain for traffic management against the loss of a rural asset, productive farmland, environment, and a community forever. These were called ‘esoteric costs’ by NZTA engineers at the public open day, and don’t count they say.
What’s more we were only given a few weeks to gather information from a standing start to formulate objections for something that would change and ruin livelihoods and landscapes forever. A process you wouldn’t expect in an OECD democratic country. It’s the further relentless imposition of the roading network.
NZTA’s justification is extra capacity is needed – which isn’t right. They say that when Transmission Gully Road is connected at Kenepuru/Linden and Petone to Grenada (P2G) is connected to Grenada – the mere 3km section between these two points on SH1 can’t cope with the extra traffic so option C or D are suddenly needed.
But traffic will drop! The traffic on SH1 Linden is the same traffic, going to the same places – whether or not it’s coming from SH1 or Transmission Gully. In fact it’ll be less after Transmission Gully Road is connected – here’s why.
Transmission Gully Road intersects SH58 at Judgeford, making it only 7km from SH2 and Upper and Lower Hutts. This is significant because moving the main Northern Wellington motorway corridor east, now means the dynamics have changed. Petone is now 19km from Judgeford whether you go via Haywards or via the new link – but there are big differences…
However the fact that SH58 has an easier climb, 5.8% and 122m from SH2 versus 9% and 290m on Petone to Grenada, (SH2 is flat) means SH58 will be the road of choice for traffic coming or going north from the Hutt, including Petone & Seaview .
The extra traffic siphoned off onto SH58, means the loss of Petone bound traffic on the Linden section of SH1. This will also have the added benefit of easing the morning queues for traffic turning left at the bottom of the Gorge.
Traffic volumes have plateaued for the last 10 years in the Wellington Region, and between 2006 and 2013 censuses the volume of those commuting by car into Wellington has dropped by 3.5% (75% more by bike).
The NZTA are using a flawed model that has traffic volumes going up with population and GDP growth – whereas it has actually plateaued, and has petrol prices remaining static for the next 30 years – something we all know is nonsense.
Further, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE) stopped the original Transmission Gully Road going through Takapu Valley because the impacts were too high. It could be said that NZTA are back trying to build it now by stealth and haste.
NZTA should go back to the drawing board and build option B that was planned for decades – simply connecting P2G to SH1 south of Tawa. It would save between $50-150million and wouldn’t devastate communities and the environment. Options C and D are nothing more than a last minute land grab tacked onto P2G by NZTA prior to the election, with no justification.
We would urge the NZTA to think again and:
- Connect Transmission Gully to Kenepuru/Linden as originally planned
- If Petone to Grenada goes ahead – connect it by option ‘A’ or ‘B’ at Grenada as always planned.
- Scrap the unjustified scheme options ‘C’ and ‘D’ and with the money saved:
- Do the upgrade on SH58, Judgeford to Haywards with a split level intersection onto SH2. Both to take the extra traffic and improve its safety. It was given consents for this purpose 10 years ago
- Remove traffic lights on SH2 with proper interchanges
- Stop working in silos and start looking holistically at Transmission Gully, SH58, Petone to Grenada and their synergies.
Submissions close on the 17th. April on the Petone to Grenada Road, and it’s tacked on options
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Whilst there have been more encouraging noises from NZTA in recent times with regard to PT and active transport modes, the parts of NZTA that seem to refuse to accept NZ’s changing transport patterns strike me as exactly the sort of unelected and out of touch bureaucrats whom the National Party regularly decries.
Also, great post!
Uhhhhm, you DO realise that NZTA does what their bosses in the MoT (looking at you, Brownlee and Key!) want? Deride them for slavishly following the CARS CARS CARS agenda set by the minister if you want, but DO put the blame where it is deserved. With the politicians.
To extend your logic do you think politicians have anything to gain in providing something they don’t think the people want? Their only agenda is to stay in power. They do that by trying to be popular and handing out the pork. They will continue to support roads only as long as they think that is what people want. We get the government we deserve.
Key worked successfully ad a bankrr he and many other politicians have limited interest in keeping their jobs and are really just trying to push the political game in their favour.
Ultimately the politicians are in charge but It still matters enormously what the officials at NZTA are in favour of.
Funnily enough in discussions with NZTA they do say often say they are only doing what they’re told; but then the politicians also claim to be only doing what they are advised. Someone needs to break the cycle, and, frankly, it should be the experts when the evidence for change becomes compelling. That’s what they’re there for.
Aside from some unforeseen crisis in circumstances, a change of government seems to be the only way to break this incestuous cycle of ministers telling their advisors what to advise, and advisors giving ministers the advice they were told to give (or if not, then expect a shortened career).
Auckland’s NZTA does seem decades ahead of the 1950s motorway planners in Wellington.
The place isn’t growing. It doesn’t need big new infrastructure.
You’re right. Even the Governments bible on transport for the next 30 years sees the major growth as being in Auckland. It describes Wellington Region as having ‘moderate’ growth. Which would be right. With the introduction of the ‘super city’ we see a move of companies etc to Auckland. Our PM has described the place as ‘dying’ and that ‘he didn’t know what to do with the place’. Auckland is the money place and as an ex money trader that’s where he’d like to be. Let his mates turn the Beehive into a casino and perhaps they’d build him a new parliament in Auckland for free for a few more pokies and another law change.
Given that Transmission Gulley is a given, we do need to fix up the existing roads that will be impacted and will take more traffic (SH58 & SH2) but we don’t need to build any new ones after this.
Transmission Gully certainly contains quite a few nasty “little surprises” including the basin reserve flyover, the consequent end of the trolley bus fleet, the destruction of existing urban amenities and people spaces in the Eastern suburbs, and now this package. In regard to growth and prosperity, John Key said at one stage that he “didn’t know what to do with Wellington”. Is turning the entire Wellington region into a giant motorway interchange the National Party’s proposed solution?
“What’s more we were only given a few weeks to gather information from a standing start to formulate objections for something that would change and ruin livelihoods and landscapes forever. A process you wouldn’t expect in an OECD democratic country.”
To the contrary, it is a process to be expected in a democratic country.
This kind of cronyism is manifest throughout both National and Labour’s policies (and the policies of every OECD country).
National continues the road building cronyism of the last sixty years, and Labour sets out to play favourites in the electricity and wood markets, to name a few.
Must say NZTA are quite crafty in their process. Provide two options and get the community to fight each other. The local councilors and poliitians can’t fight and left sitting on the fence as they represent both communities. So NZTA comes in underneath without any political fight.
Yes. “Oh, you say we shouldn’t ruin this lovely rural valley? Well, then we’ll have to bulldoze this little old lady’s house and half your kids’ school.. but, hey, it’s your choice!”
Petone to Granada seems like a sensible idea to me, but I don’t see how the extension through Takapu Valley makes much sense. Surely the issues with that stretch of SH1 aren’t around Tawa, but through Johnsonville just north of the Gorge where the lanes seem quite narrow and there are no hard shoulders. I’m not too sure what you’d do about that section since there isn’t a lot of room to play with, but it is the obvious choke point.
Did the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment really stop the inland route? She recoemneded against the coastal route but I thought she wanted designations in place quickly as per page 8 item 6 of this http://www.pce.parliament.nz/assets/Uploads/Reports/pdf/Pre97-reports/Audit-of-the-Future-State-Highway-Number-One-Route-Environmental-Impact-Report-Volume-IV-Summary-Voume-March-1990.pdf Of course that was in 1990 when the RMA was still a bill and we had the much more sensible Town and Country Planning Act.
No, she recommended that Transmission Gully Road did not go through Takapu Valley. That’s why the route was sensibly made to join SH1 at Kenepuru/Linden. Now NZTA are sneakily back trying to resuscitate there old plans in the 11th hour. There’s no way it would get built without tacking it onto the Petone to Grenada Road with haste.
Quote from ‘Audit of the “Future State Highway Number One Route” Environmental Impact Report’, Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, March 1990:
“. . .It is symptomatic of ‘traditional’ transport system planning that options requiring huge earthworks and the disruption of whole communities are seen as ‘realistic’, while anything that would require a re-ordering of priorities or change of behaviour is seen as ‘unrealistic’.”
Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Helen Hughes argued that public transport alternatives should be fully funded and implemented BEFORE making a judgement on the need for ANY road. But does anyone understand what a meaningful public transport alternative really is? It is more than just new trains running to the old timetable on the old route with a trivial extension to Waikanae. An effective public transport alternative must include extension of the entire regional rail system along the same Ngauranga-Airport corridor that is considered so needful of a motorway.
All the indications are that Transmission Gully is not needed or justified, even without such a step-change in public transport connectivity. Add this however, and its case disappears altogether. This whole roading splurge is being driven by the ideologies of a few government ministers and not by any rational analysis. However an ignorant general public is easily swept along by the “of course we need more roads” ethos.
Transmission Gully, Grenada-Petone Link, Takapu Valley Motorway, Basin Reserve Flyover, Duplicate Mt Vic and Terrace Tunnels, and Ruahine Street widening SHOULD NOT BE BUILT. Neither should a bus rapid transit system which will do little to entice public trasport users from the Kapiti area.
Instead, the regional rail system should be extended with a City Rail Link.
To repeat: “. . .It is symptomatic of ‘traditional’ transport system planning that options requiring huge earthworks and the disruption of whole communities are seen as ‘realistic’, while anything that would require a re-ordering of priorities or change of behaviour is seen as ‘unrealistic’.”
NZTA has unleashed a plan to pit communities against each other – it’s brutal and it’s unethical. They wouldn’t be allowed to do this to staff, yet their culture finds it acceptable to do this to regularly to the public of NZ. NZ was founded on small communites working together and this cuts deep. The CEO needs to account. Time for it to stop.
It appears to be an extreme measure with extreme consequences – whoever is making the decisions needs to take a good hard look at what we’re giving up…..’esoteric costs’ or not!
-Petone to Grenada aims to solve Ngauranga-Hutt Valley bottle neck. The Takapu Valley Motorway (option D) is redundant here.
-Transmission Gully shifts Wellington’s northern corridor east making Haywards SH58 first choice for Upper/Lower Hutt main trunk traffic, over SH1 & Petone to Grenada. The Takapu Motorway is redundant here.
I agree Rob. Well put. I think the NZTA must have progressed from the dope to the artificial highs because it’s obvious their brains are fried!
They don’t believe the reality in front of them that despite car usage having plateaued – due to increasing energy costs and other factors and doesn’t fit their masters agenda, so they draw the predicted line in a steep upward slope.
The price of fuel that is on an upward slope doesn’t fit either- so the predicted line goes flat – because that’s the only way that they can try and make this all stack up.
When responsible Governments round the world are trying to reduce their carbon footprint – what is New Zealand doing? Yes it’s in some 50’s time warp of massive road building and it’ll be withdrawing support for the railways..
Somebody said earlier that NZTA follow the orders of their master. Well they do – but they are aggressive Pit Bulls that are paid to chew up anything in their way,not trained lap dogs.
In reply to obi: You’re right. Both a road through Takapu Valley or widening SH1 at Tawa are the wrong solutions to another problem
.
The issue is at the bottom of the Gorge, and in particular, a single left hand lane that snakes through an industrial area in a single lane round a tight left hand bend and the joining an on ramp meeting SH2 North – incidentally to a road (SH2) that today at 4 lanes is carrying more than twice the traffic than the road through Tawa is now, or is even the NZTA predict it will in the future – that the Takapu road or the widening are alleged to be alleviating! Go figure.
Remember that when Transmission Gulley is in, the Petone bound (and everything coming from the north to the Hutt Valley), will be coming off at the SH58 and heading down SH2. It’s flatter and less high. This means less traffic at the bottleneck turning left at the bottom of the Gorge.
If you look at it logically – the only traffic that will use Petone to Grenada will be the local – Tawa and Johnsonville traffic going to Petone. Everything else has a better route. It’s a lot of rock to shift (20,000,000 tonnes) so that local traffic can save 6 minutes!
Personally, I’d put a proper 4 lane carriageway turning left from SH1 onto SH2 North – and widen the section as far as Petone to 6 lanes. And if the NZTA want to play with some rock they can take some of the point off at the Gorge to accommodate it Job done
Presumably the link road means you can get rid of the shockingly dangerous junction between SH2 and Horokiwi. As well as closing that exit and forcing Horokiwi traffic to exit at Petone, you can take the opportunity to sort out the whole Petone interchange, including the bit where north-bound SH2 suddenly does a really tight right hand turn to duck under the Petone exit. If that makes sense.
In fact, all of SH2 north of Petone is a mess of traffic lights and bizarre junctions. They need to upgrade the road, reduce the number of junctions, and make it traffic light free until at least the southern end of Upper Hutt. It handles something like 70k vehicles a day, but it is an extremely odd road.
If you don’t spend money where it’s not needed – that is increasing the capacity of a road that’s currently taking only 30k vehicles a day through Tawa by not building a motorway through Takapu Valley or widening the road, you could spend it where it is needed – that is improving SH58 and putting a proper split level junction with SH2. Taking out the traffic lights on SH2 and replacing them with proper junctions and making the junction from SH1 south to SH2 north (that you were talking about) into a proper 4 lane carriageway joining a 6 lane section of SH2 between Ngauranga and Petone.
As Rob says, Takapu Valley motorway becomes redundant as does the widening through Tawa when you do the analysis.
These improvements to existing roads would take out the bottlenecks, make the network safer and more resilient and be cheaper and far less destructive than the green field proposals on the table. Bulldozing communities, productive land, and a rural amenity should be done after every measure has been exhausted to improve the existing infrastructure – and as you point out – it needs improving.
You know, they could fix the Petone interchange and sort out Horokiwi without actually building P2G at all. Just sayin’. Then they’d have all that money to fix SH58, get rid of the traffic lights on SH2, and hey, maybe even build that cross valley link they’ve been promising for donkey’s years.
After coming back from Auckland I couldn’t believe the traffic!!!. Wow they have some serious problems. Go Wellington I cant see much of a problem and cant understand why they want to build motorways everywhere, What a waste of money. I thought we were in a recession, well thats the reason why the govt said I couldn’t have a pay rise!!
Well they’ve always got money for things they want to do like tax cuts for their mates. Auckland could have had a proper rail system over 50 years ago like grown up cities like London and Paris. – but it was brought to a halt by an incoming National Government who said that car and trucks were the way forward. Where have we heard that before Gerry?
Change of tack here….it would be very sad to see this special place be ruined – rich bird life due to local pest control and planting by residents, a pristine stream, increasing stands of native trees and access to the Belmont regional park. They wouldn’t put a motorway through Zealandia!!!
They might – it’s only esoteric!
I see Treasury is running a major work stream across all government called ‘valuing nature’. NZTA engineers don’t value communities, landscape values, nature, or ongoing value of productive farmland in their costings. Dinosaur thinking by fossil fuel inhalers.
Councils need to provide humans with diversity of living options. Wellington City Council is fast removing all rural options for people. A motorway through Takapu Valley would be the further needless imposition of the roading network on us.
Funny how these initiatives always have oxymoronic names to what they are actually about. i.e. the opposite to fool a politically illiterate populous. So you can tell when they come up with a name like ‘valuing nature’ it’s to sanitise the fact that this going to be a policy that does just the opposite.
Good to see the fantastic transportblog having a look at this wee traffic problem of ours down here in Wellington. Anything you can do to raise awareness of this sudden strange addition of the route through Takapu Valley is welcome. We have been covering the issues here in a few posts on our Eye of the Fish blog, and there is a link here to a post with more detail on this issue, that I penned a couple of weeks ago. http://eyeofthefish.org/nztas-much-clearer-now-but-the-reality-is-even-worse/ I wrote it in a bad mood, so please excuse the grumpiness.
The thing that everyone needs to get their head around is the fact the main N – S corridor has moved Eastwards with the introduction of Transmission Gulley. This changes the travel flow dynamics.
The fact that it will only be only a few kms from SH2 where it intersects at Judgeford means SH58 becomes the road for anywhere in the Hutt Valley – including Petone. What is SH58’s gain is SH1’s loss. Meaning less traffic going through SH1 Tawa section and less traffic turning left at the SH2 junction to go to Petone (which is the bottle neck).
None of this has anything to do with traffic through Tawa that will see traffic drop.
Therefore widening SH1 Tawa or slapping a new motorway through the Takapu Valley, are the wrong solutions.
What people would benefit from is the improvement of SH58 so it will take the heavier traffic and make it safer. This will need to be done as geographical facts – distances, gradients and height climbed – mean it will be route used particularly by trucks. It also needs to be connected to SH2 with a split level junction.
SH2, a road that NZTA have correctly identified as an issue, needs to have the traffic lights taken out of its Lower Hutt section and be widened between Ngauranga and Petone to 6 lanes with a motorway intersection between SH1 (S) and SH2 (N).
The work on SH2, SH58 and the SH1/SH2 junction will fulfil the objectives that NZTA say they are trying to fix – namely removing the bottleneck at Ngauranga that builds up SH1 in the morning and again going to the Hutt Valley. It will improve the flow through the Hutt Valley and interconnectedness with the main trunk road North and will reduce accidents.
So where does a widening of SH1 through Tawa or Takapu Valley motorway come into any of the real solutions? NOWHERE;.
Schemes ‘C’ (SH1 widening) and ‘D’ (Takapu Motorway) need to be rejected..
It can all be fixed and improved by applying logic to what we already have.
As a parting thought. Governments and their departments should be there to act on our behalf, to protect us and be stewards of the land and environment for future generations. It is their moral duty to do the least harm to the people and land.
The NZTA is such a department that has forgotten this and is out of control describing such values as ‘esoteric’.
Bulldozing a road through a rural valley – with it’s permanent loss of lively-hoods, quality of life for those that live there, and rural asset for those that enjoy it – trampers, cyclists, horse riders – forever – because quote ‘it’s easier than having to consider traffic management on a live road’
or
Bulldozing a swathe of houses, classrooms etc – because they can’t be bothered to move the median barrier!!!
We are not ‘esoteric’, we are real, so are houses, classrooms and lives, and to just put it all down to collateral damage goes against all ideas of natural justice.
When an arm of Government can inflict such catastrophic damage to it’s people and environment without recourse – something is massively wrong and needs changing.
I suspect not under this Government as the NZTA strides around like a great colossus, emboldened by bullying their way through – a well oiled machine with mastery of misinformation and setting community against community in fake local battles and riding roughshod over people and reasoned argument.
I think thery are seeing how many lanes they can make out of Wellington. 4 lanes State one; 4 lanes Takapu motorway and 4 lanes Statehighway two = 16. Lets make some more and rip through some more farm land!!
sorry can’t edit “12 lanes”
It’s bigger than just the number off lanes. You have to analyse where they go and what they carry. Adding more lanes through Tawa/Takapu achieves nothing. Something at he bottom of the Gorge would – so would extra lanes on SH2 Ngauranga to Petone section.
Absolutely Positively Wellington? Yeah Right!! I’ve always been proud of Wellingtons diversity of choice for living – seaside, hill, city, country and a huge range from cottage sized to mansions, basic to fancy, apartments with no grounds to huge backyards (less and less of these with suburban infill!) all so close to the hub of Wellington city. Ruining Takapu Valley takes away one of of those choices. It’s a unique place that can’t be replaced.
If you follow the routes on Google Earth ( go on try it for yourself), it is relatively easy to see the distance and gradient make SH58 to logical choice to connect all of Hutt Valley with TG.
In recent history Wellington has tended to rise above sea level during earthquakes, however depending on relative movement of the Wairarapa and Wellington faults, it is just as likely to lower. In this case much of SH2 from Wellington to Petone, including the start of the Petone to Grenada road, becomes a marine park.
As much as I would like to have faith in geotechnical engineers, Canterbury liquefaction and recent deaths from rock fall on our roads makes me a little cynical about the huge cuts required for the Petone to Horokiwi road.
To bulldoze a new road through one of Wellington’s few remaining rural valleys that already has a gas main and major transmission lines right beside a fault line seems hard to believe. Maintaining two 4 lane motorways that run parallel to each other when traffic flow does not support their need does not make any sense to me.
Given that SH58 badly needs work to make it safer, why are NZTA tacking on small link sections to Transmission Gully when it seems obvious that SH58 is the better long term solution?
So NZTA dropped this bombshell on Wellington at the very same time they dropped this bombshell on Christchurch: http://www.stuff.co.nz/motoring/news/9698808/Forget-smooth-perfect-roads-Christchurch-told
If the Government’s intention is to turn Christchurch into the next Detroit then it is only logical that most of the petrol taxes collected in Christchrch be spent in a city that will still exist in 25 years time. The construction start dates for all the remaining Christchurch RoNS have all been delayed by three years as well and since they’re all conditional on CCC spending tens of millions upgrading the roads that the RoNS connect I won’t be too surprised if they disappear completely from the RoNS program over the next few years.
Michael, perhaps your best tactic for defeating NZTA on this issue (and the Basin flyover) is to take the moral high ground by quoting from the NZTA’s Sept 2011 board minutes which states bluntly that the NZTA is so strapped for cash and can only afford to contribute $50 per year over five years.
Oops, should be $50 million. Not much when the total road repair bill is $930 million.
When all the statistics, transport analysis, cost to benefit ration, not to mention the 0% value they put on communities, the environment and the complete practicality of a project, are all stacked up against the options that they have come up with and this happens again and again with roads all over New Zealand. Communities are fighting a government department that we pay for!!!
Yes, the NZTA are out of control and acting like you would expect from a communist dictatorship where opposition is just neutralised – not like a first world democracy. They are not acting in the best interest of those they are supposed to work for by just riding roughshod over natural justice and due process. They are the bully in the playground with the Prefects badge allowing them to steal and intimidate without sanction.
A central principle of any government department in a Western democratic country is that it should act to protect its people, their way of life and environment – not the opposite.
I prefer either option A, or option C without the SH1 widening. Option B is out – it has the lowest BCR and they have to remove the existing southbound on/off ramps at Takapu Road, and option D makes no sense whatsoever. Also, I would remove the Petone northbound on-ramp and make a two-way connection to Pito-one Road instead to improve traffic links to Korokoro and the Petone station park+ride, with traffic using the existing Priests Ave intersection to access SH2 northbound.
Haywards interchange (SH2/SH58) has been planned for years. That will leave you with three sets of traffic lights left between Ngauranga and Haywards – Kennedy-Good, Belmont Hills, and Melling.
John Key is worried about the democratic policies in the Ukraine, maybe he needs to travel 15mins up the road to Tawa and see how his own agency is running rough shod over tax paying New Zealander’s. The NZTA are running around with the Public works Act in one hand and a handful of money in the other. I think if Gerry Brownlee’s mother lived in Tawa I believe things would being doubt with differently.
Whats happening in Tawa and other parts of NZ is what goes on in countries like Africa, Turkey, China, North Korea which has a dictator type system, soon Gerry Brownlee will be asking us to cut our hair all the same as his….
I am very saddened, disappointed with how a government agency that is completely paid for by Tax payers treat us as quoted “esoteric”.
I also share the same sentiment with other guys here and I have to agree with Raewyn’s comment. Why would you do some actions on your own? Most especially doing some pest control stuff without the proper guidance of trained professionals. Anyway, if we aren’t sure on the things we do like pest control, we can talk and call some guys like them http://www.anticimex.com/en-NZ/nz/residential/ saves you time and saves your environment,
I think the idea of of putting a new road from petone to grenada is really stupid. Honestly? How would you feel if the people of grenada bulldozed your house?
Think about the people around you. I’d hate to see my nana’s house get bulldozed.