Long Tunnel or Long Con?

Yesterday it was revealed that Transport Minister had asked Waka Kotahi to look at the options for a long tunnel through Wellington. State Highway 1 (SH1) through Wellington City is heavily congested at peak times and while planning continues on the duplicate Mt Victoria Tunnel and Basin Reserve project, the Government has also asked NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) to consider and provide advice on a Long Tunnel option, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.…
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Subsidising illegal parking

Hopefully finally over his obsession with raised crossings, the Herald’s Bernard Orsman has found something to actually be outraged at. Auckland ratepayers are subsidising the cost of towing, storing and releasing cars across the city to the tune of $15 million over five years.…
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Success City

Patrick Reynolds is deputy chair of the Council’s City Centre Advisory Panel. On the back of the latest Infometrics data release, the Council through its economist Gary Blick has been publishing a whole lot of great numbers: For the second year in a row, Auckland’s high-achieving city centre has outpaced New Zealand in both GDP and employment growth.…
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Paying for the RoNS like Rail

Note: Consultation on the GPS closes at noon on Tuesday 2 April See our previous post on feedback guides and check out the Transport4All guide here. The Government’s Draft Policy Statement (GPS) on Land Transport contains many ideological burbs and inconsistencies.…
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Transport Agencies don’t want Harbour Tunnels

It seems even our transport agencies don’t want Labour’s harbour crossing plans. In August the previous government and Waka Kotahi announced their absurd preferred option the new harbour crossing that at the time was estimated to cost $35-45 billion. It included both road tunnels and a wiggly light rail tunnel extending from Wynyard Quarter all the way to Albany.…
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Making PT better by experiencing it

A couple of articles caught my attention over the weekend that I think ultimately are somewhat related. First up, following a number of articles last week about he new WX1 route, yesterday Todd Niall reported on how some senior managers from Auckland Transport and Waka Kotahi tried it out.…
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Congestion Pricing back on the agenda

Road pricing, congestion pricing, time of use pricing, whatever you want to call it, it’s back on the council’s agenda with a report going to the Transport and Infrastructure Committee on the next steps. The recommendation is also that the committee “endorse the creation of a joint Auckland Transport / Auckland Council programme team to implement Time of Use Charging“.…
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Improving Wellesley St

A paper to the Auckland Transport board tomorrow is looking for approval and funding to finally make some progress on another of the key city centre public transport projects – the Wellesley St Bus Improvements (WSBI). This along with the Te Hā Noa – the Victoria St Linear Park are two of the flagship projects as part of the council’s Midtown Regeneration plans.…
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