Goodness gracious, where did July go? The upside is that as of tomorrow, CRL opening day could well be “next month”. While we wait, enjoy the week’s most intriguing stories from the realms of cities and transport.
This Week in Greater Auckland
- On Monday, Connor reported on Auckland Transport’s estimate that it could take five years to restore safer speeds in Auckland’s neighbourhoods and elsewhere.
- On Tuesday, Matt looked at the newly released post-CRL timetables, and the promise of “first looks” at the stations.
- And on Thursday, Jolisa covered two magnificent new pieces of public art, including the COOL NEW EEL immediately embraced by children (and young-at-heart adults).
This week’s header image, via Auckland Transport, is the Glen Innes train station after the level crossing has been removed.
And, looking ahead to next week in Greater Auckland: stay tuned for our responses to yesterday afternoon’s announcement that the government has committed the nation to a PPP for the Warkworth to Te Hana expressway, less than 100 days from the election. So. Many. Questions.
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Glen Innes access upgrades
On Friday the first of the new pedestrian bridges to replace level crossings at stations was opened by Transport Minster Chris Bishop and Minister for Auckland Simon Watts.
A new pedestrian bridge at Glen Innes Train station opening today is another step forward in replacing rail level crossings across Auckland with safer, easier connections.
The modern bridge, fully accessible with stairs and large lifts, replaces two rail level crossings where there had been one fatality and 18 near misses since 2014.
It’s one of three pedestrian bridges built in less than a year to support more frequent trains with the arrival of City Rail Link while improving safety. Pedestrian bridges at Te Maahia and Takaanini stations will open in August and September.
Construction of the three bridges was accelerated after the Government and Auckland Council brought forward funding, with construction beginning at Labour Weekend 2025.
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A number of improvements have also been made to the station underpass with a focus on enhancing safety. Improvements include upgraded lighting and CCTV, restored asphalt, better drainage and new fencing.
And here are some images of the updated underpass, from AT’s Facebook page:
The government version of the press release notes that the new bridge to the station cost $12.2m – a useful figure to hold in mind as Auckland Transport (or whatever it evolves into) works through the rest of the level crossing replacement programme, including out along the Western Line.
The other new stations
Not the CRL ones – Drury and Paerātā, the two new southern stations open this weekend, with services running from Sunday 2 August.
It’s not clear if there’s any official opening event as such, however Auckland Transport will be running info sessions the day before, on Saturday 1 August, so that sort of counts as an open day?
Auckland Transport Chief Executive Stacey van der Putten says the new stations are part of a much bigger transformation of Auckland’s public transport network.
“From Sunday 2 August, Drury and Paerātā Railway Stations will be connected directly into Auckland’s rail network, with trains running from early morning until late evening, seven days a week,” Ms van der Putten says.
“Over the past few years there has been a massive investment in improved public transport links for South Auckland and Franklin, with the electrification of the Southern Line to Pukekohe and big improvements to bus services that line up with train timetables.
“Auckland Transport has worked closely with KiwiRail during the design and construction of these stations, which include lots of useful features for passengers like Park and Ride facilities, pick-up and drop-off areas, and parks for both bikes and motorbikes.
“With the opening of these two new stations we are giving people real transport choices at a time when we know Aucklanders are looking further out of the city for more affordable housing and a lifestyle that suits them.”
…
- Ahead of the stations opening, Auckland Transport will be hosting a public information day for local communities on Saturday 1 August, where staff will be on hand to answer any questions people have about the new stations and the public transport services operating to them.
- The public information sessions will be held at Drury Railway Station from 10am to 12pm and at Paerātā Railway Station from 2pm to 4pm.
- Two new bus services will begin from Sunday 2 August to connect local communities with the new stations. Using one of these connecting bus services won’t cost passengers who are connecting to trains, as long as they transfer to the next service within 30 minutes.
Paerātā Station. Image: Auckland Transport
Final Section of Eastern Busway starts
Friday also saw work officially start on the final 500m section of the Eastern Busway, which will pass through a local reserve so as to not impact drivers at the huge Te Iririangi Dr/Ti Rakau Dr intersection.
Construction has started on the final stage of the Eastern Busway, bringing frequent and rapid public transport a step closer for East Aucklanders.
The final section of the dedicated busway between Panmure, Pakūranga and Botany will link Tī Rākau Drive to Botany Town Centre through Whakamaumahara Guys Reserve.
The expanded Eastern Busway, already operating between Panmure and Pakuranga, will provide frequent, more reliable journeys and better connections between Botany, the city centre and destinations across Auckland when it opens in 2027.
When the completed Eastern Busway opens, people will be able to travel from Botany to downtown Auckland in 40 minutes by bus and train, as well as have easy access to places including Sylvia Park, the Sky Tower, Newmarket, Manukau, Henderson, and beyond.
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Total funding for Eastern Busway work from Pakūranga to Botany is $1.4 billion. Funding for the final stretch of busway through Whakamaumahara Guys Reserve was approved in late 2025. Early works at the reserve began in March 2026. At the peak of construction, around 80 people will be working on site at the reserve.
A shared path will also be built through the reserve, extending local walking and cycling connections. The work is expected to be finished in late-2027.
They also note:
- The Eastern Busway will open in 2027. By 2028, the busway is expected to carry 18,000 passengers per day with projections rising to 24,000 passengers per day by 2048.
- Current project works include 5km of busway between Pakūranga and Botany, fully separated from other traffic, 4 new stations and 12km of dedicated walking and cycleways. It will deliver wide-ranging benefits for the area, increasing access to jobs and education, and attracting investment and growth.
- Whakamaumahara Guys Reserve is an area of high ecological importance. As part of the project’s consent conditions, the Eastern Busway captured and relocated 350 lizards to a new habitat at Burswood Reserve.
Despite the project going out of its way to keep buses away from cars, local MP and former Transport Minister Simeon Brown couldn’t help but continue to complain:
But, just as spades were to hit the ground, local MP Simeon Brown took the opportunity to tell the regional transport agency “don’t forget about the motorists”.
“I always say this to AT and Auckland Council, just remember, over 90% of people in this ward use their cars to get to work,” he said in his speech.
“Yes, this will create more choices and more options, and that’s going to allow people to change how they get around … But, for most people out this way, it is their car.”
“Don’t forget about the motorist,” he reiterated. “They’re the ones who will complain to me if when things go wrong.”
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Brown told The Post after the event that he believed that AT was “punishing motorists”.
The intersection the busway avoids, to not upset drivers.
The answer is always trees?
Auckland Transport are about to test sealing roads with trees.
But one Kiwi start-up thinks it has cracked the formula to harness the strength and pliability of trees to pave our streets – potentially securing a critical part of our supply chain while slashing emissions.
Founded in Gisborne in 2024, start-up Futurity has invented LIMA, a chemical derived from lignin, a natural plant byproduct of the paper-making process.
While lignin has many potential applications, the first one out of the gate aims to replace something you probably drove over on your way to work today.
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Unfortunately, we mostly just burn it. Currently, around 95% of the lignin produced during paper-making is burned on-site for heat and energy.
“Long term, we see a pathway to complete bitumen replacement with lignin-based binders,” said Kohn. “But the job now is to take pressure off the bitumen system, using infrastructure and standards that road owners already trust.”
Futurity is currently working alongside Fulton Hogan and Auckland Transport to plan trials within the Auckland roading network in the first half of 2027, testing LIMA’s performance on real-world roads.
The trials will evaluate durability, deformation, and maintenance requirements compared to conventional unmodified bitumen.
Replacing a single tonne of bitumen with LIMA could prevent up to four tonnes of emissions, while extending pavement life and lowering maintenance demands.
Waitematā Harbour Crossing watch
Nick James reports for The Post on estimates of future maintenance requirements for the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
Work needed to keep the 67-year-old Auckland Harbour Bridge running will cause “significant network and economic disruption” between 2030 and 2040, the transport agency says.
“The age of the Auckland Harbour Bridge means that it requires critical renewals in 2030-2040 that will trigger significant network and economic disruption,” documents from NZ Transport Agency provided under the official information act say.
…NZTA said projected costs for future maintenance was still being determined, and an estimation would be known by the end of the year. It comes as the transport agency works on a project to build either another bridge over or a tunnel under the waterway.The spokesperson said renewal work on the bridge will still be required irrespective of an additional crossing, but “an additional crossing will enable maintenance of the existing structure to occur without widespread disruption and eventually help to reduce the current pressures on the ageing infrastructure”.
…The [Mayor’s]office said it highlighted the mayor’s call “for unelected NZTA officials to stop wasting time on gold-plated dream projects where cost overruns are worn like a badge of honour, and focus on delivering sensible, affordable alternatives to the current harbour bridge”.
Sounds like the last thing NZTA or any of us needs is a giant tunnel mega-project with a 15-year delivery time and the potential for a decade of delays. How about an affordable bridge instead?
Western Springs Bowl
The conversion of Western Springs is underway:
The former Western Springs Stadium has a new name, brand and redevelopment plan, with the historic Auckland venue set to be known as Western Springs Bowl from this year.
A four-month, $2.5 million transformation is underway, funded from venue owner-operator Tātaki Auckland Unlimited’s existing capital budget at no additional cost to ratepayers.
The sporting configuration will be complete early next month, ahead of the venue’s first event under its new name — an NPC Auckland Rugby fixture against Wellington on August 8.
A new stage and hospitality facilities will be completed in October in time for the summer concert season.
Western Springs Bowl will host concerts and festivals of 15,000 to 30,000 people over summer, before switching to a boutique sports stadium for crowds of up to 5000, including NPC rugby.
Next let’s get that Northwest Busway built, to help get crowds to and from events…
Welly’s Paneke Pōneke rollout continues
Feedback closes Monday 3 August on a cycleway for Bunny Street, so hop on in if you live in or visit Wellington and/or have people there you care about who get around by bike, or would love to. Cycle Wellington has a submission guide.
While on the topic of cycling, here’s a nice thread on how cycling cities emerge.
https://bsky.app/profile/modacitylife.com/post/3mros6ob4rc2o
The environmental and economic cost of speeding
Some interesting research about the impact of speeding.
Speeding is a known contributor to high energy use and emissions in road transport, yet its large-scale impacts remain underexplored.
Here, we analyze over 120 million vehicle trajectories from four representative days in 2021 to quantify energy consumption, costs, and emissions from speeding for light-duty internal combustion engine vehicles across the continental United States and Hawaii and for battery electric vehicles in California. Two speed limit interventions on highways and arterial roads are evaluated and extrapolated to the national vehicle fleet.
We estimate that adherence to posted speed limits could save more than 6 million gallons of fuel, 18 million US dollars, and 50,000 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide per day, while increasing travel time by only 54 seconds per driving day. On an annual basis, these savings are comparable to removing about 5.5 million conventional passenger vehicles from the road.
A walk along a ghost railway line
New Zealand has a lot of ghost railway lines around the regions. Here’s a fascinating account of an attempt to walk just one small section of one. Keep reading, it gets better/ even more thought-provoking:
In December, amid a fit of grief and anxiety, I spend the day walking the length of the Makaraka line. Makaraka to Gisborne; 5ish km, what I expected to be about an hour’s walk…
But instead compounded into five hours of delirious sweaty bullshit.
I would like to stress before we get into this that you shouldn’t do this! Not just because it dips into private property — which I discovered enroute and did not walk through — but because it sucks. If you want to walk along a rail line, walk along the ‘active’ bit in Gisborne. Walk along the Kapiti line in Wellington, or along various bits in Auckland.
You have significantly better options.
Do not do this to yourself.
Upcoming events
Roskill Moonlight Ride – Saturday 1 August.
The Moonlight Ride returns for its 3rd year!
Join us for a magical night ride under the full moon – a free community event full of bikes, music, creativity and fun for the whole whānau.
Urban Room Talk with Professor Marco te Brömmelstroet – Tuesday 4 August.
As Auckland grows and changes, Professor Marco te Brömmelstroet challenges us to think beyond movement and consider what makes a city truly successful: what kind of city are we creating, and for whom?
And don’t forget about pre-registering for the CRL station visits.
Videos to enjoy
The cost of building rapid transit is astonishing in the Anglosphere (see: Auckland Light Rail, RIP). Why?
A great video on the development of BRT in Curitiba.
Old signs and fonts of Auckland, rescued and curated…
View this post on Instagram
And, an oldie but a goodie – on Auckland’s motorways:
That’s it from us this week. Have a great weekend!
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Great weekly roundup, thank you. In less optimistic news, Warkworth to Te Hana has been signed. Looking forward to your take on this development. Ngaa mihi
+1
Does anyone recall the previous National Government, that was accused of Holiday HIghways, under their “Important Roads” agenda.
This government seems to have continued that, offering to upgrade many places, but in the end finding money for the Holiday Highway.
Seems a little deja vu? Or can that only happen in France?
Do you remember how happy the public was when the “holiday highway” was built and how quickly Labour backed off from calling it that once it was open.
Face it you’ve lost, the public have had their say and the politicians have noticed this and have shied away from calling them holiday highways.
I would rather keep protesting than face the facts
Hooray for the destruction of precious kahikatea wetlands! All hail the tarmac golden idol and the destruction of nature! We can’t wait for the landslides and the invasive pests using the motorway as their own highway to kill our native birds! What an excellent waste of money!
Yes, I’m interested to see analysis of the BCRs.
It would be great to see an alternative proposal that spreads the $3600000000 over al of Northland roads , plus railway and public transport.
It would be hard not to at least double the BCR.
That’s exactly it. A fancy road is nice and all but could we get a better bang for our buck by putting that funding elsewhere into Northland?
Does anyone know if there are plans for installing passenger gates at Glen Innes? It’s a high-volume station and it’d deliver real revenue and crime reduction benfits
Strange thing with the new GI station is there is no external wayfaring (yet?)
No train symbol, no Glenn Innes Station sign on the Apirana Rd entrance. Would have thought a train symbol on the tower would have been a great opportunity to signpost the station
Te Rapa has nothing either and it’s been open for a decade or more!
From what I can remember there were two customers on the branch firstly silos about half way along which loaded grain into containers from an overhead conveyor. The containers were left on the wagons. At the terminus there was a cool shed for a apples maybe it was something like apple and pear board.Anyway pallets were loaded into box wagons with forklifts. I believe the apples just went to Napier port but the grain went further some may have gone all the way to Hamilton.
The Gisborne City Vintage Railway group had always wanted to use the truncated Makaraka branch, but nothing ever eventuated. It would make for a nice short return trip from the town station.
I believe the are still running out to Muriwai during the summer months.
Tigi Ness lives in Ivanhoe Road, so that’ll get the “Grey Lynn Gen X property millionaires who still think they’re left wing” brigade out against the Western Springs busway station
This may have been answered previously, but why was cricket dropped from the Western Springs redesign? Very sad that Auckland has no where to host our national summer sport.
The Auckland cricket situation always reminds me of the ‘boy shoving a stick in his bike spokes meme’. Eden Park is massively compromised for rectangle sports because Auckland Cricket wanted it to be able to continue hosting a fictional cricket ODI with 40,000 spectators. The council has (rightly) said that cricket is accommodated at Eden Park, so they won’t be providing another stadium venue. Auckland Cricket then complains that they don’t have a venue for the cricket matches that actually occur because they can’t sell enough tickets to pay for Eden Park.
Cricket should have moved out of the main stadium at Eden Park, with a small stand maintained at the outer oval. Then Western Springs could have accommodated the 5 cricket matches a year that attract more than a couple of thousand spectators.
We get very few ODIs and no test matches, something needs to change. Although I note NZ cricket seems to think Eden Park is fine for ODIs when it suits such as world cup.
Almost every other city in NZ has a stadium that can be used for cricket. There are cities that have a population of 50k that get more days of international cricket than Auckland does.
Auckland Cricket has moved to Colin Maiden Park. They have insinuated this could be further developed as the home of test cricket in Auckland. I hope not.
The Western Springs idea fell over because costs started to escalate. It also floods fairly easily, as we found out a few years back. Shame.
Auckland Cricket has moved to Colin Maiden Park in Glen Innes.
https://www.aucklandcricket.co.nz/newsarticle/166989?
But not NZ cricket I assume? ODIs and (non-existent) test matches would still be Eden Park?
India and Sri Lanka are visiting this summer and Eden Park will host two matches against the former, one ODI and one T20I.
It’s difficult to imagine the Black Caps ever playing a test at Colin Maiden Park. However that is more likely than them playing another one at Eden Park.
I personally like the Vic Park proposal. A permanent stand to block the flyover and the rest temporary facilities, like Hagley Park in ChCh.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/cricket/victoria-park-test-cricket-proposal-revealed/4HNLA4HIFJBNRC3IAH6WWBVI2A/
Simeon Brown has no grace.
“Don’t forget about the motorist,” he reiterated. “They’re the ones who will complain to me if when things go wrong.”
Most MPs don’t seem to understand the difference between the complaints from the overly-entitled that their particular positioning attracts, and the responsible action leadership requires of them.
Motorists complain because driving is shit. It’s a hassle at every turn, so of course they are going to complain.
The fallacy is thinking those complaints mean anything or come to anything. It’s like complaining that smoking makes your cough worse.
Whingemaster continues to sabotage Eastern Busway by last-minute complaints to change objectives for a project that was started before AT existed, adding cost and delaying completion. Doesn’t he get the message – a small percentage of Pakuranga/Howick/Botany car drivers using PT instead will give those who must drive the road space and time they want. Or just drive your car to the nearest bus stop and leave it nearby.
Maybe toll the Tamaki River bridges.
Quite apart from the fact that the Eastern Busway design is so “driver first” that it remains to be seen how well it will function as a rapid transit service, the simplest answer to Simeon is that urban rapid transit is in it self “for the motorist”.
When it succeeds, ie when it is well designed; is sufficiently frequent, reliable, and fast, then enough people use it to keep the driving option actually viable.
For example, without the Northern Busway system carrying around 50% of the people in the peak direction at the peaks, the Shore-city Motorway system would completely fail everyday, for every motorist. And the city’s economic would be even less efficient and productive.
This is not a difficult idea to understand, especially for someone who believes themselves qualified to not only be minister of transport, but also the most interventionist one in living memory.
But here we are.
The WX Busway is a disgrace. Now it wants to take away more residential space, including as aforementioned, a very important person in the history of our city, not just around the Dawn Raids, but also the father of Che Fu.
The 18 runs fine from New Lynn into the City. Past the Zoo, MOTAT and Western Springs Stadium.
Why do we need to repeat the mistakes of our motorways raping our city, with Busways that do the same, and in the meantime destroy existing neighbourhoods?
We will have a CRL soon, the Eastern and Western Lines will be considerably faster on their new through route.
Busways must be reconsidered with CRL in the mix.
We need to build transfer stations. New Lynn and Otahuhu are excellent examples of train, bus transit stations, including drop off areas from cars. Otahuhu serves a huge amount of South Auckland, New Lynn serves a huge amount of West Auckland. This is excellent use of train stations.
Why do we need to attack our environment with more concrete, to justify future environmental benefits?
Stop, think, and reimagine a city with the CRL, and what bus routes can be redesigned around the efficiencies of the CRL.
I regularly catch the 30 and 309; from the CIvic centre is convenient now, but with the CRL, it would make more sense to run these two buses from Newmarket.
There are too many bus routes into the city, we do not need them post CRL opening, we need more space for pedestrians everywhere, and buses affect this too.
Let us start thinking like a rail first city, and build our infrastructure with that at the front of mind.
Public transports have a quality ratio. Trains are the most comfortable, ferries are bad at rush hour, but wonderful boat trips. Buses are horrible, and always will be horrible, but necessary in our Los Angeles sized city.
Where we can reduce the need for buses must be our future.
A stadium in Western Springs does not justify destroying Ivanhoe Road.
bah humbug
I think you can make the argument that the plans for the NW express are over-cooked/over-engineered in their current form and certainly involve a lot of land acquisition that mightn’t be necessary for a more restrained approach (why not liberate some lanes e.g.?), but having a north western PT priority route alongside the motorway is far more practicable and practical for people than out that way than transferring to the rail lines even under idealised conditions like continuous bus lanes.
Agree, the western line and the northwestern busway serve different suburbs in West Auckland, and forcing Te Atatu/Massey/West Harbour/Whenuapai residents to go via Henderson and New Lynn is not a realistic substitute for a busway along the northwestern motorway.
However, with CRL the NW busway and road pricing coming, there should be proper consideration of reallocating existing motorway space. They should not be letting NZTA grab enough additional land to facilitate 12 lanes between Western Springs and Newton funded by the busway project.
The Paerātā station is quite unbelievable.
A huge gross car park in the middle of rolling fields. I hope it becomes a busy hub for the area of course, but I hate that this overpriced station, same as Drury, was so gold-plated because of parking.
Same story – half of every rail budget goes to roading, access, parking…
I assume there will be articles on these openings alone, as it’s quite a big deal and should see some good network growth, CRL aside…
but they could have been far less overblown
These stations start with PnR to get some customers from rural areas until the housing that’s planned by developers is built.
The Auckland motorway film could be used in professional development for elected members and anyone in the transport sector. After watching this film, how many now debunked myths can you name and explain what needs to be done instead? The more you can name and resolve, the fewer sessions you need to sign up to.
Something to discuss next week?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/petrol-prices-expected-to-fall-as-road-user-charges-set-to-replace-fuel-tax-officials-say/H5AFT3URBBEHROJKI2CVLXWEUE/
“but said the petrol tax had fallen by 20% in real terms since 2020” – a 20% move towards everyone pays rather than user pays, mostly under a National government. Funny how their ideals don’t apply when they suit…
Wonder if NZTA are still working to the July deadline for their Waitematā Harbour Connections announcement.
…it appears not!
Interesting to note that while speeding I agree does all that you’ve mentioned in the article. Enforcing those speed limits requires tonnes of fuel in New Zealand alone. NZ police even have turbo charged cars for Highway speed enforcement making sure they can accelerate up to 140 to get someone doing 111 in a 100.
So while speeding can waste fuel enforcing limits can use fuel as well. Not trying to troll just pointing out the truth.
It’s just nonsense though isn’t it
James is a sociopathically pro-car individualist, everything that he types is nonsense.
looking forward to Warkworth to Te Hana blowing billions over budget (not to mention the interest repayments), doing bugger all to actually solve Northland road bottlenecks and resilience, and ending up being a shoddy job like Transmission Gully!
A Labour government with guts and a spine would do exactly what NACT1 did with ALR. Regrettably, Hipkins is a spineless centrist.
It’ll solve Dome Valley, Te Hana, Wellsford that’s 3 bottlenecks it solved stop being so dishonest. Also hahahaha I told you it was getting built no matter what.
Labour kind of screwed LR up themselves they just couldn’t get it started where as this government is getting on with ignoring evidence like the majority of the public want.
fair point, at least you’re honest you’re a spiteful heartless troll who doesn’t care if billions of dollars are wasted to pander to your addiction. I’m so very sorry for giving a shit about my generation and future generations being able to have a fraction of the prosperity that your lot have hoarded
I’m the same generation (GenZ), it’s not wasted money (well it is) but it’s this or nothing for Northland so just build it anyway. It’s the same s**t all over again with Puhoi to Warkworth you lot (I used to be like that so that included me) said it’s a waste and it’s just a “Holiday hwy”. I truly believed the lies of the then Transport Blog until I lived in the far north and realised how crucial a better roading connection was needed. No one that matters looks back and says “it was a waste” they just look at the benefits of the project and how much time it is saving everyone.
I am now a free thinker and don’t believe everything this blog or what “evidence” or “experts” say as you can get that stuff to say just about anything you want. Remember the experts that ruined much of our generations social abilities by keeping us in lockdown for months longer than it needed to be. Or the “experts” who said the Covid jab would stop transmission, then the story changed to ok it won’t stop transmission. The story changed a few more times after that but I don’t want to get too far away from Transport. If I found evidence that said not enforcing speed limits could help climate change by saving millions of litres of fuel per year would you support that?
At the end of the day we live in a demokracy people have a right to not listen to experts and evidence.
So you selfish lot have the right to destroy the human race’s chance of survival, not to mention every other species on this planet in your greed-ridden pursuit of speed? All because of “democracy”? Screw that, and screw you. A bunch of rotten apes that don’t know what’s good for them do not have the right to turn Earth into a inhospitable, runaway-greenhouse effect and genocide every species.
Also, lmao, you have no evidence that hooning around at 120-whatsit km/h saves fuel. Because it doesn’t.
https://www.tyrehub.co.nz/blog/driving-to-save-fuel
and Gen Z, eh? Good, that means you’ll suffer the consequences of your godawful ideology. I look forward to you contending with higher food prices as the famines kick in when crops and stick-in-the-mud farmers can’t adapt to changing weather patterns fast enough. And from there, the shortages. Maybe you’ll get caught in a storm, or a landslide caused by a storm. Maybe we’ll get water shortages here, if the AI bubble doesn’t collapse. Power grid failures. And wouldn’t it be wonderful for those two to coincide with a deadly heatwave and humidity?
Not to mention the late-stage economy inevitably barrelling towards some form of collapse, and hopefully it’s of the sort that hurts or kills off the billionaires and fat pigs who are to blame for this horrid economic system, not the one that kills off working class, poor, and marginalised people
I bet you won’t be thinking about your speed addiction then, huh. Although your ideology is one of a total lack of collective responsibility, so i guess you’ll find an excuse to blame “greenies” instead of confront the fact that you are wrong.
Yes Burrower if you don’t like democracy go live in China or Russia where the emissions are even higher ironically.
I know 120kmh doesn’t save fuel but I don’t care about the evidence and want to go faster regardless.
Burrower I’m somewhat of a Greenie myself I go to lots of beach cleanups for example. I care a hell of a lot more than many of these new Kiwis that just drop their ciggie or wrapper when they are done with them. I’ve done research on the emissions stuff and I’m really not too worried about NZs emissions.
Once again you’ve tip toed around my question… enforcing speed limits in NZ requires loads of fuel should we stop that in pursuit of climate change?
I don’t think we have to worry about destroying humanity’s chances of survival when there are 9 billion people on this planet, but NZs over reliance on road and air transport is a real weakness those other countries you mentioned don’t suffer from
Gawd – this is tinfoil hat territory. Once vaccines are mentioned, I think we know it’s not a worthwhile discussion any more, save your keystrokes.
I made a short video of the new blue tunnel GI tunnel.
https://youtube.com/shorts/_cU_UvxLmQk?si=ntdp4D4iHX2eefzq
Thanks for that. Nice looking tunnel. Wonder what it feels like at 10pm….
I expected a maximum 80kmh speed limit to save more than 2.3% petrol and 2.9% diesel, given a 20% cut in speed and square law. It must be because most traffic is slower than 80 already.
Carless days can be seen as much more effective.
https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/08/01/lowering-speed-limit-to-80kmh-in-govts-plan-in-case-of-fuel-shortage/
I would say that’s been worked out by someone who doesnt like going slower then 100 km/hr. Would save 10 % at least .
https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/08/01/lowering-speed-limit-to-80kmh-in-govts-plan-in-case-of-fuel-shortage/
@James
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I hope Trump bungles Iran again. I hope we have to face a fuel shortage. You deserve to be held up at 80km/h seething and raging.
I would be ok with slowing to 80 if things really do get that bad.
You really think that’ll actually be legally enforceable also if police had to enforce it that would actually waste more fuel. I would expect Acusensus to Cease its mobile speed camera operations immediately as that uses a lot of fuel. I would then expect police to cut back on Radar speed enforcement as while Radars are cool they use a lot of energy to operate and then even more fuel when they accelerate from 0-130 to get someone going 96 in an 80 zone. Also do electric cars have to comply I doubt we will ever see this implemented but it’s an interesting thought experiment.
So let me get this straight, you don’t mind slowing down, despite spending the past few months arguing about about much we need $ billion dollar motorways so you can drive faster?
Will the government recalculate RoNS cost benefit ratios to account for the new 80kph speed limit? My guess is no
@craw no I’m happy to slow down if there’s an absolute fuel crisis and we are going to run out. It’s not just about speed either I’ve said about how the new route will be safer. Anyway by the time the road opens a significant amount of EVs will have been purchased too and the fuel crisis will be over anyway. And again that’s if we ever get to stage 4 which I don’t really see happening stage 3 possibly.
History tells me if supplies get too low there will be fuel rationing not just speed limits
On another note, this blog needs a new RoNS PR person cause I ain’t buying whatever you’re selling