Yesterday both Auckland Transport and the NZTA made announcements on some recent consultations. They were discussing just some high level results rather than any detailed analysis – which will now begin.
East West Link
AT and the NZTA received quite a bit of feedback about the project with around 1,700 responses. Their summary of some of the key points shows that they’ve noted some of the concerns we and others have raised – such as the land-locking of the cycleway and access for rail to the airport from Onehunga to remain feasible – they’ve also had pressure on the other side from the trucking lobby who want even fewer intersections which would make it even more motorway like.
Fabulous feedback for one of Auckland’s priority projects
A wide range of feedback has been received on the preferred approach for the East West Connections transport project, from suggestions about providing cycling on the seaward side of the new foreshore road to design ideas to improve transport performance.
The NZ Transport Agency and Auckland Transport would like to thank everyone who gave feedback on the preferred approach to improve transport connections into and out of Onehunga-Penrose and the reliability of bus services between Māngere, Ōtāhuhu and Sylvia Park.
About 1,700 feedback responses were received and approximately 250 people came to the open days. All the information is still being analysed. A summary of feedback, and how it has been used, will be released later in the year. In the interim, these are some of the key themes that have been noted:
- Suggestions regarding the design of the route with the aim of improving transport performance. Key points include the desire to reduce the number of traffic lights and intersections (particularly to assist with heavy vehicles movements), changes to the design of the Neilson Street Interchange and also the interchange at SH1
- The East West Connections project continues to maintain opportunities for achieving future rail connections in the area, including rail to the airport.
- That the project should improve access to the harbour and Onehunga Wharf
- Walking and cycling facilities should be provided along the seaward side of the new foreshore road (with connections back into Onehunga). Opportunities for improved walking and cycling connections should also continue to be explored. For example connections to Māngere Bridge, Onehunga Mall, Mutukaroa-Hamlins Hill and Orpheus Drive.
- Natural features such as Anns Creek and the Hopua Tuff ring should be protected and that potential impacts from the project on water quality, air quality, and noise need to be carefully considered and managed.
- Support for proposed bus and cycle lanes between Māngere, Ōtāhuhu and Sylvia Park, but some concerns that the bus lanes would be shared with freight vehicles.
The NZ Transport Agency’s State Highways Manager, Brett Gliddon says the responses will help refine the agencies understanding of what needs to be considered as the project progresses.
“We are still in the early stages with the concept design for the preferred approach. The feedback will be used to help us make decisions as we move from concept through to detailed design. For example identifying where cycle lanes should be located, things we need to consider when designing intersections and how we can improve access to the harbour.”
Auckland Transport Key Strategic Initiatives Project Director Theunis Van Schalkwyk says the feedback is part of an on-going conversation with the community the Transport Agency and Auckland Transport will continue as designs are further developed.
“We’re very pleased with the level of support we’ve received around the proposed improvements to speed up bus journeys between Māngere, Ōtāhuhu and Sylvia Park. The feedback will be used to help develop the designs for the bus priority lanes and cycle improvements.”
The Transport Agency’s Brett Gliddon says the next steps for the project will be to undertake further investigations on the preferred approach and confirm the land needed to protect the route. If people have feedback, thoughts or ideas at any time we would encourage them to contact the project team on eastwest@nzta.govt.nz”.
North Shore New Network Consultation
AT received massive feedback for the new network on the North Shore with over 3,150 responses or comments. To put that in perspective both the South Auckland and West Auckland consultations had just over 1,000 responses each. Give the level of feedback I suspect that means it’s likely to take much longer to get any results and final decisions about the network.
Local feedback will make a better bus network for the North Shore, AT says
Auckland Transport has begun analysing more than 3150 submissions received from the North Shore New Network consultation.
- Over 2,400 formal submissions (including 26 in Chinese).
- More than 750 comments on the online discussion forum, which will also be counted as feedback and analysed.
- 5 petitions were received.
- More than 32 events were held over the six week consultation period, where more than 3,400 people were engaged with.
“There was a high level of public participation on the North Shore, almost double than previous New Network consultations, and we want to thank everyone for their feedback,” says Anthony Cross, Public Transport Network Manager.
“The more local knowledge and opinion we get, the more informed our decisions will be, and the better the final Network we can deliver.”
The next stage is analysis, which entails evaluating feedback and investigating issues raised.
“When a concern is raised by the community, we look into it in detail,” says Anthony. “This can include exploring different options and the operational and financial implications, such as where bus stops would be or where a bus could turn around.”
“Ultimately we aim to make the best decision for the largest number of people, within the constraints we are given.”
Early results show a range of support and opposition. One resident supported the “better connections to alleviate the demand for parking at the park and rides,” and another commented that “more frequent weekend trips will make public transport a more viable option when travelling with family.”
Once confirmed, the final decisions and service design will be available at www.AT.govt.nz/NewNetwork or people can sign up to an email newsletter to be kept up to date.
Implementation is planned for 2017, a timeframe which is required so that any infrastructure changes can be made, and a competitive tender process can be carried out to decide which bus company will operate each route, on certain parts of the network.
Tenders will be released following service design completion in the first half of 2016. A comprehensive information campaign will be held prior to implementation to make people aware of the changes.
“Many people we spoke to during consultation were eager to see the new bus network happen earlier than 2017, but there’s a lot involved in making changes of this scale, so we’re doing it in phases by area.
“Over the next two years we will have delivered a New Network for the whole of Auckland, starting with the Hibiscus Coast this October.”
Consultation on the new bus network for the North Shore ran from 2 June to 13 July 2015. The changes proposed would provide a number of benefits, including new frequent bus services on key routes across the North Shore running every 15 minutes, 7am – 7pm, 7 days a week, and a more connected, and easier to understand bus network overall.
Past consultations for the New Network have included: Hibiscus Coast, West Auckland, South Auckland and Pukekohe and Waiuku.
More information is available at www.AT.govt.nz/NewNetwork.
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Is there any indication of whether the East West link will have ramp signals at its interchanges with the existing motorway?
Nielson St the Ramp signals seem to cause much greater delay than the intersections the new link will bypass. How is spending 100s of millions justified if all it does is get you to the back of the ramp signal queue faster?
Jobs for the boys though!
Agreed. Commonsense says that the design of any route should be all about FLOW, be it a road, rail, cycle, bus network, whatever. The Trucking industry is right to ask for less impediments. Every time a truck (bus, whatever) stops, believe it or not – it costs us all in real dollars somewhere down the line.
No, the design of any route should be about maximising within constraints, not simply throwing money at a road to make marginal improvements to vehicle speeds. If we spend too much money on FLOW, it can actually make society worse off by diverting scarce resources (tax dollars!) from other, more productive uses.
Let’s illustrate with an example. Let’s say that every extra hour of delay incurred by a truck costs $100. Let’s also say that we have an intersection that sees 1000 trucks a day, every weekday. At present, the average truck is delayed by 1 minute. We could totally eliminate that delay by building a grade-separated cloverleaf intersection instead.
This would improve FLOW and thus cut costs for freight customers. The annual value of these savings is equal to around $400,000. (1000 trucks/day * 250 working days/year * 1 minute delay/truck * 1 hr/60 minutes * $100/hr)
Now, let’s say that the government would have to borrow $20 million to build the cloverleaf interchange. (This is a cheap intersection!) Now, the current NZ government 10-year bond rates are around 3.3%. If we then calculate the annual repayments required to pay down the principal and interest over a 30-year period (i.e. assuming that the debt is rolled over), we find that the intersection will cost the government (i.e. taxpayers) over $1 million per annum.
My question to you is this: Is it rational to spend $1,000,000 to save $400,000?
And that’s not even including opportunity cost, if a better-performing project doesn’t happen because of the money you are spending on cloverleafing, OR the fact that the cloverleaf may have external disbenefits not cpatured in the simple analysis!
“OR the fact that the cloverleaf may have external disbenefits not cpatured [sic] in the simple analysis!”
Or not captured by the the simple ANALYST.
Considering that right now, most key on ramps for trucks (the current one where SEART and SH1 meet, Grafton Gully on ramp, Onehunga on-ramp to SH20 south – are a few that spring to mind), have “truck only” lanes (vehicles over 2.5T) that allows unfettered access to the motorway at all times even when the ramp signals are on.
Of course, the problem is that the on-ramp signals, when active, simply cause massive tailbacks of SOVs onto normal roads – which does nothing except prevent the trucks accessing the “anytime” on-ramp so they become grid locked.
But this simply shows that dedicated freight only lanes should be put in place leading to those truck only on-ramps first.
gosh Greg unfettered, you obviously haven’t been through the southbound Greville ramps in the peaks, first the setting on the ramp metering is way too quick, so it is ineffective at preventing queuing on the on-ramp, then the “HOVs” coming through on the bypass don’t know how to merge into the merge lane, causing more of a mess, the the trucks (often truck with multi-axle trailer) have greater difficulty merging because of their length, all causing delay to the Northerns and 881s trying to bypass the slow motorway
a dog’s breakfast
Exactly. We might want to spend this money on preventable diseases, for example, or simply leave it in people’s pockets.
Several billion per year on unnecessary projects adds up to a very large number over a decade.
Edit: this was in reply to Max’s comment above about opportunity costs.
Grafton and SEART have the same problem now, but this “requirement” for unfettered motorway access *is* the primary justification for this $2B monstrosity.
So, a simple solution of freight only lanes on to these freight only on-ramps would allow the supposedly higher economic value delivering freight trucks onto the motorway while the [low value] SOVs and HOVs are kept at bay.
That will cost under $100m, cheap but effective outcome, which will be needed anyway, even with the $2B spend.
So why try the cheaper $100m freight only lanes option first, and see how it goes NZTA?
Was I the only one who gave feedback that the East-West project isn’t required (and I work right in the middle of that area so have first hand experience of the traffic – it isn’t nearly as bad a many other parts of Auckland) because I can’t see that feedback in their summary?
I find it hard to believe that more people gave feedback that they would like to cycle alongside a motorway as long as they had water next to them, than people who said the project was not required in any of its current proposed forms and that an upgrade to Neilson street and how it connects to SH20 is all that is required.
Of course not, they are just picking the “themes” they want to implement.
Discussing putting the cycleway and walkway on the seaward side, makes it easier to hide and therefore justify the building of the road in the first place.
The same “picking the answers they want” also became very apparent during the “consultation” last year.
I certainly told them to fix up the existing roads first for trucks [replace parked cars with freight lanes for instance], improve PT so people don’t need to drive to work in Onehunga and wait for the WRR to open and settle down, then and only then review the demand patterns and see what change if any is needed.
Are there any laws around how this process is to be conducted to stop it just being a walk through the motions? Can a OIA request be done to ask them for a details on number of responses which suggested the project should not go ahead and suggested alternatives instead?
Sure, you can send that OIA in.
Well I said practically that. I too work in the area and said it was practically empty after 7pm so if this goes ahead we will have three very underused roads out of peak (new motorway, highway 20 and Neilson St). Ridiculous they are even contemplating it. As for buses between Onehunga, Sylvia Park and Mangere – there are only infrequent routes at present, so unless more is planned there is no real reason for this either.
Agree with Trundle -what was the level of outright? Anyone know how to do OIA requests? Looks like a spin job.
This site shows you how to do OIA requests https://www.fyi.org.nz/
“Auckland Transport Key Strategic Initiatives Project Director Theunis Van Schalkwyk” could take time out to reflect on whether what he is proposing here is actually in any way strategic, rather than a tactical response to a (powerful) special interest group.
I use these routes most days. Truck movements here are not the issue: the vast majority of vehicles here, like everywhere else in the isthmus, are single occupancy private cars.
Quite, NZTAs own numbers show that on the most crowded roads here truck movement make up 18% of the total vehicle movements, but without a doubt, NZTA’s trucking lobbyists all have the starting position that:
“we can’t possibly accept that any delays to any trucks are good for business.”
Hence this pile of shit.
They also quote out of date numbers for Metroport showing 220,000 “Twenty foot Equivalent” (TEUs) were moved in or out of Metroport in 2012 (3 years ago FFS), via some 2,500 “truck” movements a day at peak.
Well, you can move 125,000 forty foot containers (which each count as 2 TEUs), in 50 days, making that 220,000 so what does Metroport do for the other 180 or so “working days” of the year?
Sit their idle?
Anyone else find NZTA’s giddy description [fabulous!] of their work more that a little unnerving…
Anyway contrasting these two projects, the sledgehammer to crack a walnut for trucks, and the highly compromised zero budget bus reorganisation on the Shore, brings to mind a paraphrase of one of Homer Simpson’s greater utterances:
‘Ah Transport Infrastructure Investment, the solution to, and the cause of, all of our problems’
Its a contrast between the rates funded local government and the fuel tax, general taxation when needed and “future fund” funded central government agency.
So in the left corner we have “King Motorway Midas” aka NZTA, for which we find everything they touch turns in to a motorway project, even for something like a cycleway.
In the other corner we have the “Never mind the quality, feel the width” organisation aka “AT” whose zero-sum game approach to PT reorganisation is evident.
It’s not AT/AC who want the zero sum approach on PT. They actually dragged and scraped together enough money (with the help of some Councillors with vision) to improve our PT while the Ministry of Transport keeps throwing sticks into the spokes while also blaming us for not really knowing what we want / for wanting PT in the first place.
Sickening, is the word I am using.
Got access to the true to scale photograph overlay (OIA) and this thing is HUGE. Asked why this was not shown to the public and the answer was, “can’t do that, it only frightens people”.
If you have it via OIA, why don’t you publish it somewhere (or send it to the Transport Blog folks)
Shown it at private meeting with NZTA.
I thought Homer Simpson great utterance was “and fire made it good”. It is applicable to some many things.
Seems like they did not get my feedback that the East West Truck Loop isn’t required for $2 billion either.
On twitter l posted my delay times for transiting the entire Neilson St numerous times while l visited my clients. Worst hold up at lights was 1:45 minutes… Even if l had double that l can’t stomach a $2 billion taxpayer bill to please powerful trucking magnates.
On North Shore Network consultation – AT never listened to locals for the Nor West consultation. Only when the PTUA stamped the ground has AT now got a project reviewing rail to Kumeu-Huapai. I have little faith in AT consultations. Nor do l trust the NZTA.
There always seems to be cues of cars/trucks trying to come off SH20 at Onehunga (Northbound) – so a fix to this is required. Also it can take a long time for trucks to be able to pull out onto Neilson street from the numerous side roads (how will a semi-motorway help this?), but other than that I can’t see where the delays are during peaks hours. Just seems like a road looking for a problem.
Something bent going on here. Nothing adds up. Notice how the cycle and walkways were on the inside of the motorway? Done on purpose. We will “demand” they go on the seaward side and you can guess the rest. Licence now printed to fill in a lot more of the harbour, to suit the motorway, which is what NZTA wanted. Brilliant!
ye of little faith.
It’s being presented as a fait accompli to be built in some form in the immediate future. How did the East West Link even get on the agenda?
How much influence did Mainfreight have? How much influence did Ports of Tauranga have? What role did Simon Bridges have?
I think that a series of sharply worded OIAs are required. I’m not going to make accusations without proof, but the process for this project has been extraordinary.
Totally agree. What is GeneratioZero’s strategy on this as they seem to be leading the charge? Would be good to get the government (NZTA) to agree that if it can be proved that the road is not needed that they invest the money into the CRL instead (i.e. full CRL costs) as business case for that has been proven. That should focus their minds.
The justification for this project is suspect. The figures given to the general public such as truck movements, GDP generated in the area, people working in the area etc simply do not add up. The true to scale picture shows a monster highway.
The NZTA sponsored report, after 66 pages, says better public transport is needed. It also says the link will not fix congestion in the area, unless the public transport is improved. Oh dear….
I say to the all powerful truck lobby, and people in the eastern suburbs who enjoy driving to the airport, get the money spent on public transport and you can have the roads to yourselves. Do the whole country a favour at the same time. This motorway monster is simply not needed.
It does seem ridiculous that given the choice of spending money on the CRL and significantly improving the rail network or spending money on the east west link and just moving the problem from one road to another, the government and AT chose the latter! Surely no one thinks that this road is going to fix the problem and there will be no more traffic issues in that area?
The next thing will be a complete upgrade to motorways 1 and 20 due to the increased vehicle counts from the east west link! Where does it end?
NZTA’s implementation strategy for its projects increasingly seems, au fond, to be spin over substance or never let empirical fact obstruct a politically expedient opinion. The East West Truckway is not needed; the current proposal, consulted or not, doesn’t resolve what is, in effect, a temporal problem; and it’s certainly not wanted by a majority of Aucklanders. You can be assured that it will proceed as planned.
Somebody makes money out of building these mega roads. They are the ones pulling the strings behind the scenes.
Here is NZTA’s summary of responses. No hard numbers, I note: http://www.nzta.govt.nz/assets/projects/east-west-connections/docs/feedback-sheet-oct-2014.pdf
And here is the full document dump. Happy fisking: http://www.nzta.govt.nz/projects/east-west-connections/publications
Read the summary of the feedback from last year, this one line says it all about every option except the (pre)chosen one:
“…but others did not think it would be enough to resolve the transport issues and that it would also negatively impact on industrial zoned land”
What “others” didn’t agree?, and how much is “enough” when it comes to solving truck caused congestion issues?
So not only is the trucking lobby able to get special pleading so are industrial landowners. Of course they want the “limited access arterial” to provide them as landowners with full access to their properties for free.
FFS, if you’re going to build a f**king motorway through a place no matter what, then the *absolute* best land to build it on *is* industrial land, not on a foreshore, on greenfields or on residential land, nope, industrial land is the best land suitable to be wasted like this.
And better yet, industrial land that has no better use than parking cars or other low-value items. Which is what about 60% of the so-called industry down there consists of.
The numbers supplied by NZTA do not add up. Makes me think they have yet another route in mind, or the whole thing is bent. Only name and shame will stop this.
I wonder how many of those North Shore submissions are the usual NIMBY “CHANGE NOTHING AT ALL, EVER”, and possible one or two “let me drive my 4WD on the busway”.
You’re cynical.
Which doesn’t mean you can’t be right 😉
Why pick out the Nth Shore? Are there not NIMBY’s or people who are afraid of change, don’t understand the change, all over Auckland?
Cause we are talking the North Shore submissions here?
Cause high consultation participation (except in unusual case, i.e. SkyPath) often tends to indicate higher rates of negative comment?
You aren’t from the shore are you bryce…………
North, North Shore . What I’m trying to say is there are likely some very valid points, from the pov of the submitfer. Whether they are right or wrong in terms of the network is a part of the consultation process. Not everyone has read Human Transit, or the other multitude of PT related books oyt there, and so the vast majority of Aucklanders have almost no understanding of how transit networks operate other than how it directly affects them. To constantly call them out as NIMBY’s, especially if we haven’t read the submissions, is unfair. IMO, the term NIMBY is being greatly overused.
I think it more likely reflects an appetite for better public transport options. Instead, why not give AT some credit for a well-executed consultation programme that generated a strong community response? Their material made it easy to see which services would go where, and how frequently, which made it much easier to provide feedback.
And also, let’s not call everyone who has a different view to our own a ‘nimby’ – do we not want to encourage debate here and elsewhere, rather than bully those who are engaged in their local environment but have a different perspective and are prepared to speak up on it?
I am a bit worried about some of the New North Shore Network proposals. This is BASED upon what I have read in Human Transit.
For example the New Network proposes connections at Albany and Constellation bus stations and the removal of buses at peak that travel from the suburbs through the Alb/Cons Bus stations to Auckland (76X,85X,86X,87X,881).
Human Transit says
“Does the connection require a walk, and if so, is it safe and pleasant, both day and night and in all typical kinds of weather?”Answer Yes- it is quite a walk to Alb/Cons stations from where people live. The Alb/ Cons Bus Stations are not great for connections from the perspective that not very many people are well placed to walk to them.
“Does it offer additional ridership potential? If a transit network organizes itself around connection point C, that means C will have an unusually high level of transit service, because lines will be radiating from it in several directions.”
In the morning do people want to radiate several directions from Alb/Cons Bus stations? No. 95% go one direction only – South on Northern Busway and over the Harbour Bridge.
“So if the goal is ridership, the agency must also ask: Is C a place that will attract high ridership itself, so that we get the maximum ridership benefits from the high level of service that we’re proposing to offer only there?” Answer No people do not want to “Hang-out” at Alb/Cons BSs.
Torbayite, you appear to misunderstand Mr Walker a bit. In the first place the connections he is talking about is the connection from one bus to another, not people walking to the station. So there is no walk required to connect from one bus to another at Albany station, and it is easy, safe and pleasant in all kinds of weather. In that regard it is almost perfect, being a purpose designed transfer station.
On the second point you do miss the point. When you have a major connection point on the network you create a location with abundant connectivity with the ability to go to and from the point from various places on a direct bus. Indeed Albany will have good connectivity, a bus to Massey uni, a bus to the mall, a bus to long bay, a bus to Rosedale, a bus to Browns Bay, etc. the point isn’t about whether people radiating out from in the morning, it is that the network radiates to that point. But yes, Albany and Constellation are missed opportunities in that regard, we provide them with wide spread bus connections but it is only for connecting, we can’t take advantage of that connectivity to serve the station areas because there is very little nearby (currently at least, Albany centre is now starting to develop close to the Busway).
The reason for connection is a little more nuanced. Your NEXs and 881 tend to be nice and full, but your 86x and the like are not. You suggest 20 people per bus on the through express stuff? Well that is one third full, two thirds empty (If you are taking about a double decker NEX it is 4/5ths empty!).
What that means is you have an entire bus running in to town to do the 1/3 a bus worth of work. Or in other words, three of those buses could terminate at Constellation and fill up one extra NEX or 881 to the city. This is important in the first instance because we can’t accomodate many more buses in town so we can’t accept any that are only 1/3 full. But then the best bit happens. Because your feeder bus isn’t running all the way into town you can turn it around and do another suburban run. So the same bus resources but you can double the frequency and capacity between, say, mairangi bay and Constellation station.
The other concern I have with the New North Shore Network is that people who positive about it may not be aware of how bus the buses and the Northern Busway stations already are. This is understandable as there can be more buses than the timetable. The Northern Express written timetable shows at 0700 there are Northern Express buses every five minutes. However the electronic board shows them every three minutes and this is how often they leave. I have a suspicion that the message of “do not think only about the peak” may have resulted in the peak been under attended to.
The buses are busy. I filmed on my mobile phone at Constellation one morning and got 1,088 people going to the CBD in 27 minutes (which covert to 2,400 per hour). This was on 24 buses (45 per bus). I am worried if the “feed and thru” become “feed and stop” Constellation and Albany will be swamped. (Estimated maths 36 buses with 20 people on each = 720 people over 2 hours). To unboard (2 seconds per person 1,440 seconds), to board 3 seconds per person 2,160 seconds. Extra time bus alighting 3,600 seconds- exactly one hour. So 50% of time one more bus is at the station.
If you are at Constellation in the morning peak now there is a Northern Express bus every 3 minutes, an 881 (Auckland Uni/Auckland City Hospital/Newmarket) every 7 minutes, one of the 76X 85X 86X 87X supplying the Civic centre about every 7 minutes and a bus through Ponsonby every 20 minutes. It is probably hard for people who use this to see a benefit of changing to a New Network!!
If any one doubts my maths please say so I have not had anyone to check them with!. If you have more data please add. It provides a good framework for discussing how busy the stations are, or at least how busy we think they are, unless someone has a good video of on/offs volumes on you tube!! (Pretty hard to argue against a picture).
There will be 46 NEX buses an hour on the new network, 20 NX1, 20 NX2, 6 NX3, representing capacity of around 4500 an hour if they are all double deckers
Human transit pg 147
“As every airline, train company, and transit agency knows, you don’t want to make a connection. What you really want is direct service to where you’re going. And if you have such a service now and I take it away and require you to make a connection instead, you’re going to be mad at me.”
I do agree connections can be useful. But if a connection is not needed do not put one in!. Jarrett refers to airlines using connections. However when flying is popular I think airlines do better flying direct ,IF THE FLIGHT IS FULL or NEAR FULL. Do you think Air NZ or Jetstar will do better if they stop flying to Gold Coast and direct more flights to Brisbane? Answer will depend on popularity if GC is popular enough flights will go to both. IF there was a reduction in flyers there would be changes to flights.
I think this could be the problem with the New Northern Network. The northern Busway at peak is busy enough not to need Albany and Constellation to be connections ALL THE TIME. (I have actually seen 886 and 887 buses been Peeped out of the way at Constellation in the evenings as near full NEXs arrive and want to unload and go to Albany. They have almost empty 886s 887 in their way!!
Your comparison is a little off because Air NZ don’t have a super frequent flight between Brisbane and Gold Coast to connect to. You’ll also note that there are only four or five flights a day to the GC, most of the time your best bet is to actually fly to Brisbane (20 odd flights a day) and catch the airport to gold cost train which runs every half hour.
Here is a better one, why don’t Air New Zealand fly from Christchurch and Wellington direct to London? They could probsbly fill up one plane a week each doing so. It is because they have frequent connections from Wellington and Christchurch to Auckland, where the demand for the three cities together (along with all othe NZ connections) means they can support two flights a day to London.
With the direct service model you’d have to wait for a once a week flight to London, with the connective model you have the choice of two flights a day. It’s far cheaper for the airline to have connections to one big plane leaving AKL that it is to have a half dozen direct flights on small planes heading off at the same time.
Talking of long flights brings in the factor planes cannot get from a to b without stopping.they MUST use connections. Singapore Airlines flies daily from Christchurch to Singapore
Yes but they only fly there because it is a connection point to onward travel across Asia and Europe, they aren’t flying there because of the volume of Christchurchers wanting to visit Singapore itself. For Christchurch, Singapore Changi airport is the Constellation Busway Station of the air route. You go there to change vehicles to get somewhere else, not because you want to go there.
The real question is why isn’t there a direct flight chch to Bangkok, or to Kuala Lumpur, or New Delhi etc. It is because connecting through Singapore is far more efficient and allows a far better selection of travel times and destinations than if you tried to deliver direct service to every major city in Asia. All those places are in range of Christchurch, it’s just totally infeasible to provide good service levels with direct service.
I agree. Rather than trying to fit express services in, lets ramp the NEX up to it’s full potential. Then you can ramp up the frequency of the local buses as they don’t need to replicate (or worse, create a separate non connecting )route.
And unlike planes you don’t have to transit any border agencies like customs or immigration when you make connections to trains or buses.
As Patrick, and Nick is saying – Frequency is freedom.
With motorways, you’ll go some way out of your way to use the motorways at each end because the overall trip time will be quicker.
So in effect you are changing modes (from slow surface streets to faster ones).
As long as the end to end journey time is less than the direct route, connections are fine and will win out over single seat/point to point journeys.
To get that to work you need frequency of the services that connect – so its turn up and go.
Hence as Patrick says – Frequency is freedom.
OSme good points here. However the plane comparionn becomes a bit diffiuclt because the reason there are no planes direct to London from NZ is they cannot fly that far.
Trains and buses still do cross borders. In Hungry they had to ring up and check what to do with a NZ passport arriving! The chunnel does the entering Britian part in Paris when I caught it a couple of year ago.