The latest edition of the excellent Going Solar transport newsletter outlines a new piece of legislation that the Victorian State Government in Australia has passed to ensure a better and more integrated approach to transport. The Transport Integration Bill is briefly outlined in the Going Solar Newsletter – as shown below:
There are a number of very very important steps that Victoria is taking to ensure it gets the best transport and land-use outcomes. For a start, this legislation clearly links the two together – stating that you can’t talk about land-use without transport, and vice-versa. It also looks at all aspects of the transport system as a whole – whether they’re roads, rail, busways, trams, cycleways or whatever.
It’s also useful to have a look at the legislation itself. The policy framework detailed below gives a good summary of what the Transport Integration Bill seeks to achieve:
It’s pretty depressing to contrast the steps forward being taken in Victoria with the giant leaps backwards occurring here. Instead of integrating land-use and transport in Auckland, we’re splitting them into two separate agencies; instead of integrating the central government approach to funding different types of transport, we continue to have a situation where state highways are funded one way, regional arterials another, public transport improvements a third and rail infrastructure improvements a fourth.
Another reason for the brain-drain to Australia?
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I do wonder how much is hype, they have a Labor government there and our recently outgoing Labour government here talked about similiar things (sustainability, equality) while these things got progressively worse under them, more of the same in Vic..? Case in point their state transport strategy, it looks very PT friendly but all the confirmed funding is for roading…
It’d be good if this can be followed up after it is place and see how well it operates…
We need a minister of transport who is really interested in a fantastic, integrated system in NZ instead of pet projects and roading lobby campaign contributions… That will start with one network agency and one pool of funding…
I see a lot of ‘principles’ and ‘objectives’ there. To be honest the Victorian transport politics/economics situation is as bad as Auckland’s, its designed to fund and build freeways and roads very easily. Anything else like new rail lines or even bus routes are full of fractured semi-private responsibilities, no regular funding stream, no political representation at the top (Vicroads answers directly to the Minister, public transport is spread across three agencies several steps down the chain) and is therefore almost impossible. Cycleways seem to get built because they come under the road or freeway silo of funding and responsibility.
I’m not sure if this is going to change anything much. It sounds like it could and should, but whether this bill overcomes the realpolitik of the status quo is another story.
Typical of today’s policy, meaningless dribble. “integrated”, “sustainable”, “inclusive”, “prosperous”, “environmentally responsible”. Why not actually set some proper objectives, such as we aim to reduce oil usage by 20% by 2020. We aim to increase PT patronage to 20% of peak trips. They actually mean something.
Yes I find Labor/Labour governments talk a big game about PT and the environment but when the analysis is done and the budgets signed off reality doesn’t match the rhetoric… I trust Green parties on both issues…
I actually have a bit of faith that the Labour party here in NZ has turned a bit of a corner on transport matters. Of course it’s likely we’ll have to wait a fairly decent while to see if that’s true, but I think they started to see the light by 2008.
By the time Labour’s likely to end up back in power the effects of peak oil will probably ensure there’s only really one way for transport policy to go anyway I suppose.
I do agree, I think the first time MPs are really good… The jury is still out on Hughes for me and I shall read their manifesto with interest before the next election…