As I mentioned in a post a few days ago on how I think Auckland should integrate transport into its future spatial plan, probably the biggest planning mistake ever made in Auckland’s history is allowing so much development occur east of the Tamaki River: with such poor transport connections. In particular, the planning of this development area occurred at such a time (broadly the 1960s through to last decade) when Auckland really didn’t care much about public transport – so this whole swathe of Auckland ended up with no public transport infrastructure whatsoever – not even a bus lane more than a few metres long along Pakuranga Road.
I plan to do a series of blog posts over the next few days outlining my ultimate solution for solving what I call “the southeast problem”. Ultimately, as the title of the series indicates, I believe we need to build what would be a very expensive railway line out to serve this part of Auckland. While I recognise this seems rather unlikely any time soon (and therefore I have supported interim improvement options like median bus lanes along Ti Rakau Drive) ultimately I think the transport problem faced by this part of Auckland is so significant and the public transport offered is so poor that we will need a railway line out here sooner or later. Furthermore, I think it’s at least worth getting it “on the books” as a possible future project: particularly when it probably makes more sense than other big future projects bandied around: like North Shore Rail or (even worse) another road-based Waitemata Harbour Crossing.
So in this series of blog posts (I will break it into a series so that they’re not too lengthy) I hope to provide a thought-provoking argument for this potential future addition to Auckland’s rail network. The series is broken into three posts – with the next two coming in the next few days:
- This post will talk about the need for better public transport out in this part of Auckland and outline how bad things are at the moment.
- My next post will discuss a range of possible solutions, their pros and cons and why – eventually – I think it is a southeast railway line that’s needed.
- The last post will describe the route of the railway line is some detail. While it certainly requires some tunnelled sections (the extent of the tunnelling will be an interesting point of debate) what’s surprising – to me at least – is how possible the route is through a built up area of the city with demolishing hundreds of houses.
As regular readers of this blog would know, I have discussed the southeast railway line (sometimes referred to as the Howick-Botany Line) in some detail in the past. However, I think it’s useful to “put it all together” so that we can think about the merits of this possibly future project in a holistic sense, that we can compare it to other options and so that we can examine its route in detail.
So, if we start first with the problem. That can be pretty easily established simply by glancing at a map of Auckland’s southeast – a huge development area with very poor transport linkages with the rest of the city. In its broadest sense, I’m talking about the area shaded in red below – although probably not really the southwest corner of it as that’s close to the Southern Motorway, Great South Road and the existing southern railway line.
The Tamaki River forms a natural barrier separating this part of Auckland from the rest of the city. There are two crossings quite near each other around Panmure and Pakuranga, and a relatively new crossing from Highbrook Drive that connects to the Southern Motorway. Any other connections are way further south – around Otara or down near Manukau City: once the Tamaki River has run out effectively.
The limited number of crossings, particularly in the northern part of this area, create a number of significant bottlenecks. Most traffic tends to use the southeast arterial (the route with the number “10” on it in the map to the left). This semi-grade-separated highway eventually joins in with the southern motorway just north of Mt Wellington – meaning that traffic from this whole corner of Auckland eventually merely has a merge lane onto Auckland’s main north-south motorway.
For public transport, the situation is even worse. There are no railway lines, no busway, no bus lanes (aside from the most pathetically short bus lanes you’ll ever see along Pakuranga Road). In short, there’s basically no public transport infrastructure at all. This means that the service is exceedingly slow.
The results of this transport situation can be seen in the statistical data for how people in this part of Auckland get to work. Data for the Howick ward of the Auckland Council (which covers the northern part of the area shown to the left) indicates that at the 2006 census there were 113,508 usual residents living in the ward (this has probably grown quite a bit since then as it’s a fast-growing corner of Auckland). Of those residents, 89,000 were over 15 years of age and of those 89,000 around 58,000 went to work on census day 2006. Yet out of those 58,000 the number who used public transport was minuscule: a mere 1,467 took the bus and 156 somehow took a train. Others may have taken the Half Moon Bay ferry, which would show up under “other”. Even for Auckland, which only has around a 7% modeshare for public transport getting people to work, this area is exceedingly low in terms of its public transport use. There probably were quite a few more than 1200 people a day using the buses out here – as Howick Ward alone contains around 11,000 students (of 15 years or older). This demographic are generally fairly strong PT users, often because they cannot yet afford to own a car.
So what effect does the lack of public transport infrastructure have on the quality of the public transport possible in this corner of Auckland? Well, looking at timetables for the two main routes that service this part of the city, it would seem the main effect is to make catching the bus exceedingly slow. The 50/51 route travels along Pakuranga Road and provides a link between downtown Auckland and Howick/Pakuranga. The 680/681 route travels along Ti Rakau Drive and provides the main link between downtown Auckland and newer developed areas like Botany, Dannemora and Flat Bush.
A trip on the 51 route from Cockle Bay School to Britomart takes around one hour and 15 minutes during peak times. Similarly, a trip from Mission Heights in Flat Bush to Britomart also takes an hour and a quarter. While some express buses exist, and go a rather weird way via Tamaki Drive, they still take at least an hour from start to finish. Anecdotal evidence suggests that these times are often quite optimistic, and can take a lot longer. That’s pretty hopeless really, as a train trip from Pukekohe or a bus trip from the Hibiscus Coast can often be faster than this.
Decades of very poor public transport in this part of Auckland has meant that it has become highly auto-dependent: as shown in the figures above. Considering that many of the people who live in southeast Auckland have come from overseas cities (the Howick Ward of Auckland Council has the highest proportion of its residents born overseas of anywhere in Auckland) which would have often had good public transport systems, it has been a huge missed opportunity to not provide public transport of sufficient quality to this corner of Auckland.
In the next post I’m going to look at possible options for improving PT to southeast Auckland. I’ll have a look at ways to better take advantage of the Half Moon Bay ferry and the merit of current AMETI proposals. Other possible ideas are very welcome!
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I have caught a few buses to howick lately and have noticed the expresses via Tamaki Drive on the timetable…. I cannot begin to understand what purpose they provide- they stop at Panmure Station, before almost perfectly duplicating the eastern line right into Britomart… It just takes 10 mins longer and is less comfortable. Atleast express buses that duplicate the southern line travel at 100 kph, and then service the upper cbd which is less accesable by train, but these tamaki drive ones have neither. Benefit. Why cant people transfer to a train at panmure? From your stats, it looks like 156 already do.
Why can’t express buses use SE Highway and the Southern Motorway?
The 681 and 680 is a joke; they take for ages to get to town in the morning, by taking all the back roads in Auckland.
I currently have three main options to get to town:
1.) If I decide to catch the bus, I need to walk 10-15 minutes to the closest stop, WAIT for a bus that takes more than an hour to get to town and then walk another 10 minutes to the office. (The bus gets stuck in traffic, since there are no real bus lanes.)
2.) Drive to Panmure station (15 minutes in the morning), catch a train 17 minutes to Britomart and walk to the office in just over 5 minutes (shorter since I exit in the new Westpac building)
3.) Drive to work in 20-25 minutes (pay for parking) and walk 5 minutes to the office.
A point raised in the post is the number of students in the area. We have Macleans College, Pakuranga College, Howick College, Botany College, St Kents, Edgewater, Sancta Maria College and the new schools being built in Flatbush. The question is where will a large number of these students study and how will they get to the new campuses?
Do you have figures showing where people living in this part of the city go to for work, education, shopping, entertainment etc? If so, are these transport patterns going to be discussed in future installments?
I wish I did Obi, but that data is mighty difficult to acquire. I have tried getting it out of census information but it’s very challening. Any suggestions?
None. But the system you’d design would be different depending on whether most people worked and socialised locally, in Manukau, or the CBD. Someone must collect the information, otherwise how would the council do its planning?
also, will tertiary student be studying at the new MIT Campus in Manukau at the new station or will they be going to AU, AUT and other tertiary institutions in the CBD?
Well the beauty of my preferred solution is that it provides much better access to the CBD and Manukau and between town centres within this part of Auckland.
The data is there from the 2006 census, it’s just a case of fiddly work collating tables and locations. I’ll see if I have some time spare shortly to do this and we can do an origin-destination assessment.
Do you want to use the meshblocks comprising the new Howick Ward as the base? So something like this, the number/proportions of people in the area that work in:
1) The same area,
2) the rest of (the old) Manukau City,
3) The CBD,
4) The rest of Auckland City
5) Waitakere City
6) North Shore City
7) Papkura
8) Franklin
9) Rodney
10) Other
I wonder what Jamie-Lee Ross’ view is on Public Transport. Will be interesting to see if he includes it in his campaign for the Botany seat, if he does not will the other candidates run with it?
I don’t have data, but I grew up out there, and I know how isolated it is from all of the rest of Auckland, even if you have a car. The bus was terrible in the 70s and is clearly no better now, forcing everyone into cars. For teenagers this is urban design acting as promotion of ‘boy racer’ culture: drinking and driving was basically what we did. Luckily the cars were gutless [as was most of what we drank!], but I did lose one friend while at school. And critically the culture out there was all the more restricted and lacking variety and vitality. It was such a schlep to get to see any other way of life other than limitless suburbia that very few kids bothered, leading many to slide into a dreary conformity.
I know that the 70s were probably the apogee of bland suburban culture but still I don’t think the problems caused by this sort of isolation have gone anywhere.
Interestingly the South East is just as separated from Manukau City Centre as it is from the CBD. And this is part of the genius of the South Eastern rail idea, it is a big connector for all of South Auckland from Onehunga to Pakuranga [assuming it is proceeded by the Onehunga-Manukau City -or South Western Line].
As well as suddenly bringing all those people into efficient reach of the CBD. And this is vital for AK’s success. The CBD is about to get a new purpose built Theatre and a new expanded Art Gallery, Conference Centre and more and it will be great not only for the people living in this vast dorm to be able to easily get to these places but also vital to the viability of these ventures.
A multiple win then. The centre gets more life and viability, the SE dorm suburb becomes less isolated and isolating and therefore better to live in, and the whole of South Ak get interconnected. A big step towards making AK the best city to live in in the Asia Pacific region.
Protect the route now.
You think that bothers the good burghers of Pakuranga/Botany/Howick? Means it’s that much harder for those nasty brown people from Otara/Manurewa/Weymouth to come and sully the neighbourhood with their brownness. One could almost call it perfect urban design, from certain perspectives.
Remember, the south-east is the non-Manukau part of Manukau. Everyone else is poor and brown, but the south-east is not.
And I’m only being semi-facetious here, too. There was definitely strong resentment of the south-east being part of Manukau City when the entity existed.
Ruben Wiki lives in Botany, on Chapel Rd, opposite that bunch of shops…I think.
Anyway in terms of connectedness Otara is actually quite central to many places and roads and many people have to drive past Otara to get to Botany or Howick.
Matt on one level you’re right, this is the Melissa Lee idea: motorway as barrier to keep the underclasses out. It appeals to some as a good idea. But in reality it doesn’t work, burglary still happens in Howick, Pakuranga, and Farm Cove. It’s stupid. And having effective PT connections between suburbs doesn’t not show up as any kind of contributor to crime levels.
I know under the old local gov. structure some in places like Howick hated having to be part of Manukau City, well those idiots now probably hate the idea of being somehow part a city with K Rd too, or whatever way their fears and prejudices hang, but really you don’t seriously want to pander to these views as part of your transport planning do you?
Those views were definitely alive and well when I was living out there about 10 years ago. There was always the perennial “why are we part of Manukau, we should be part of Auckland, or (better yet) our OWN city.”
But yeah, when I was living out in Pakuranga in the early 2000’s as a late teenager, it was most certainly the same car-centric bland suburbia that you describe from the 70’s. The height of social entertainment out there was the Crook & Flail and London Shed *rolls eyes*.
Oh boo hoo. Glen Innes is only 4km from Paratai Drive, Beach Haven is minutes from Northcote point etc. Who cares.
Shall we tear out the soutern line because Papatoetoe is only a couple of stops away from Remuera?!
Don’t give “them” ideas!
Seriously, did people think I meant what I said? Really?
@ Obi Maybe you are missing the point somewhat. Maybe people predominantly work/socialise in local area but in many cases thats probably because access to the rest of Auckland is so poor, so people are stuck there.
If people do predominantly work in East Auckland because there I guess you would agree there is no need for an AMETI road works either.
This is the old argument in terms of how to measure benefits of increased mobility.
Talking of missed opportunities – the lovely Rotary Pathways (along the western shore of the area, from Half Moon Bay to Pakuranga) are being extended all the way to Panmure Bridge (consent’s been granted recently).
As (comparatively) narrow walking paths.
Adding a meter or so in width would have made this a great cycling route. But no, that wasn’t done. Sad.
There is maybe still this percpetion that pedestrians and cyclists don’t mix. Which is nonsense, if the path is well-designed – i.e. wide enough to appeal to recreational and commuter cyclists, but not so straight and level that racing cyclists will be tempted (who, really, are just a fraction of all potential cyclists, but in the “dark years” where the only ones who continued to ride at all, so now people think cyclists = racing cyclists).
In saying that, as someone who is a “racing” cyclist, I’d probably use it (although nowhere near my usual cruising speed) as it’d avoid the horror that is Pakuranga Rd. Ever as a guy who does 400k a week most weeks I pretty much refuse to ride Pak Rd past the mall if I can.
No offense intended to racing / sports cyclists. Just that their particular way of cycling admittedly doesn’t mesh well with peds. Horses for courses. If sports cyclists are happy to go at reasonably slow pace where sightlines are bad or pedestrians are on the path, they are more than welcome in my view.
No offense particularly taken as I know some grade A douchebags who race.
Thing is though is I’ve seen similar behaviour from commuting cyclists towards pedestrians. Anyone who is moronic enough to do 30+ on a shared path needs a slap upside the head. Its a respect thing really IMHO.
Although in saying that I’d exclude the North-Western bikeway from that as that has for the most part essentially been designed as a ‘bike motorway’. Shared paths like Tamaki Dr… the minute you’re going faster than a speed where you can stop if a small child runs out in front of you, its time to get on the road.
Would you believe that we have cycling speed limits on the Gateway Motorway Cycleway and it is enforced by police from time to time, and people get fined for riding too fast?
I can understand doing so, but there is an inherent problem with that – speedo’s on bikes are an aftermarket extra unlike with cars… how (especially a new rider) without any reference around them is someone supposed to know what speed they’re doing.
What is the speed limit and is it restricted to bikes only, or is it heavily used by pedestrians also?
Come on Auckland!. Who gives a sh*t where East Auckland was part of. North, South, West and East are all the SAME CITY now!. Anyway, lets hurry up and build this time line. Len Brown said the Manukau is future proofed for a through connection.
* Build The City Tunnel, completing a the rail link throughout the city centre
* Replace the Eastern Line section which shares tracks with the Southern Line with the Panmure-Manukau Section
* Build the Southern Link at the Manukau Branch Junction
AND FINALLY!… After the Onehunga/Mangere Bridge section is complete, push from Manukau/Puhinui & FINALLY! onto Auckland Airport!. Remember, it was Sir Dove Myer Robinson who could’ve had this done, but NO!, No one listened & now look at Auckland. Now, we must grasp the opportunity to clean up this mess of Auckland’s Transport System & low density in the suburbs.