Comment has been made (re. the Gully route) on readying the inner city roading first – a valid comment in my opinion. Anywhere and everywhere any road is improved to this level just shifts the traffic jams to a new or at least different place. For those who live in Horowhenua or Manawatu and travel to WGTN on a regular basis (or avoid doing so for similar reasons), the trip between Paramata and Otaki can be diabolical. Transmission Gully will only improve a small part of their trip.

I’m more interested in the light rail idea for Wellington city. A decent system will encourage more of those out-of-towners to use the existing trains.
I suspect what many people are thinking of is a modernised version or extension of last century’s rail system that pours thousands in and out of Wgtn every day.
But what if the muted light rail were more like a glorified fairground rail (think Ghost Train and/or Roller Coaster)? Let’s face it – we’re already a decade into another century. Why can’t we think futuristic and design a system of programmable cars which, on activation will join a set rail track and take passengers to preprogrammed destinations. It dosn’t have to be a ring system either (though that may be a starting point) – with modern technology I don’t see why this idea should be a problem. Then you build a massive car park near the central railway station and close off the CBD to ALL traffic unless they purchase a special pass. A ring road would allow bypass to skirt the city for those travelling to the airport or for those who live in the eastern suburbs (though the light rail could be extended out to the eastern suburbs if it were proving successful).

To some extent, at least, it should relieve the need for some of the other roading projects currently being discussed even if just scaled back a bit..

“The one thing that your five pages of glowing coverage of the Transmission Gully decision failed to mention (Dec 16) was the project’s benefit-cost ratio of less than one. This means that, for every dollar spent on building the new road, only 36c-50c in benefits will result. Put another way, the road doesn’t make economic sense.

Does it make sense for other reasons, such as resiliency? Perhaps, if it weren’t being built along a fault line, didn’t involve a mode of travel vulnerable to oil-price rises, or add significantly to our greenhouse gas emissions.

Transmission Gully isn’t smart thinking. It’s a 60-year-old solution that will cost us more than it will benefit us, leave us $2 billion poorer, and no closer to having a better, more sustainable alternative.”

ROBERT ASHE, Muritai

Max says: where the hell is Paparangi? Is it up the coast? Or at least as far as Johnsonville?

And as unpleasant as that may be to those Paekakarikians, Pauatahnuians, Plimmertonians and Paraparaumuans, the simplest means is to put a numberplate reading camera on every road out of town, and charge them a fee.

I also cannot fault scott. The lack of congestion charging in Wellington puzzles me. Especially given how easy it would be to implement. More on this later perhaps…

Actually, even that’s not quite right – the route is so steep, and likely to be reasonably tortuous on truck gear boxes, so we’ll probably find that the truckers still use the coast, which will be much smoother flowing once the pesky car-drivers have left it.

But you are right when you talk about the cost benefit ratio – I can’t for the life of me see how the costs stack up into anything other than a giant Boondoggle for the mad little tyrant Peter Dunne of Ohariu. He’s been so quiet of late – Nats have got him well muzzled, which is just as well as, like all little terriers, he’s bound to bite an ankle or two. I suspect, that like you say, this scheme is the payoff for Dunne.

There are so many disadvantages in the scheme as well though, that people don’t seem to realise at this point. Jenny Brash, Mayor of Porirua, thinks its a great scheme, possibly because her constituents are going to be supplying labour and gravel for the project. 10 years of work in the vicinity can’t be too bad. But there will be massive crappy side effects for her richer constituents, along Pauatahanui Inlet, as the poorer cousins drive along what is currently a very narrow little road. How long before they start to complain to her?

And most of all, it makes me wonder who owns all the land now that the Gully route is planned to go on?

Quite simply, I support efficient road building. Projects with a good benefit cost ratio should go ahead. From this package I can observe the only good projects are bypassing Paraparaumu and Waikanae, and four laning from Peka Peka to Otaki. Kapiti has been appalingly served by its councils and a safer state highway is positive, but…
1. There is no capacity problem between Pukerua Bay and Mackays Crossing worth addressing. Paekakariki has an intersection problem, but that should be addressed specifically.
2. Pukerua Bay ought to be bypassed on its own.
3. Mana/Paremata has no real congestion issues anymore with the recent upgrades. The case for a bypass is modest, but would be so expensive as to be a low priority.
4. Aotea Quay-Ngauranga Gorge hard shoulder running would be cheap and worth considering, but perhaps best as toll lanes. That’s too innovative for New Zealand today.
5. A second Terrace Tunnel and second Mt Victoria Tunnel are only worth proceeding with if the old Tunnellink Urban Motorway extension is built. Frankly I’d do all of that ONLY if congestion pricing is also introduced to finance it, to significantly pedestrianise the CBD and narrow Jervois Quay.
6. Basin Reserve flyover should be part of a proper bypass, until then it’s a small patch up job.

I hoped for far better from the Nats.

I know there are far better road projects in Wellington with the Petone-Grenada link road and in eliminating all traffic light based intersections on SH2 from Upper Hutt to Melling, but that’s what you get when a “road of national significance” is announced.

The solution of the Greens is naive and makes no better sense, the real solution is to have a peak time only cordon around Wellington’s CBD and to make progressive upgrades to SH1 as the cost/benefit analysis justifies. The congestion charge would substantially boost the viability of public transport.
Time to go back to BCR thresholds of 2.5/1 for roads, sadly the Nats (and Labour before them) threw away economic efficiency.

“The National Government’s plan to bulldoze a new four-lane motorway from Levin to the Wellington airport is plain stupid,” Green Party Wellington Transport spokesperson Sue Kedgley said.

“It makes no sense economically. It makes no sense environmentally. It doesn’t even provide Wellington with a secure alternative route in the event of a major earthquake,” said Ms Kedgley.

The Government’s plan involves building a second Mount Victoria tunnel, a second Terrace tunnel, a fly-over around the Basin Reserve, a motorway through Hataitai, and another through the heart of Kapiti. This will bring about a meagre 10 minute saving for commuter drivers.

For every dollar invested in the Transmission Gully project, there are forecast benefits of only 36-50 cents. The historical cost benefit ratio for major road projects in New Zealand is 12 times greater than this at $6.10.

“The economics of the project simply don’t stack up. Add to this the fact that volumes of traffic on our State Highways have been falling for the last two years and you’re staring into the eyes of a $2.4 billion white elephant.”

One of the main justifications the Minister gives for building Transmission Gully is that it will enable a second route out of Wellington in the event of an earthquake. But the Minister admitted in Parliament that sections of the route will be built on an earthquake fault, and would take longer to clear in the event of an earthquake than the Coastal Highway.

“It’s madness to build a new motorway on an active earthquake fault, and the Minister knows it,” said Ms Kedgley.

“This project will sever Kapiti, destroy communities, and make Wellington a congested, unliveable city like Auckland. Our rail corridor should be moving these peak volumes of traffic and freight.”

“The Auckland solution of building more motorways to solve congestion was a failure. Why do we suddenly think it will work here sixty years later?”

Green’s alternative plan for Wellington’s transport problems:
http://www.greens.org.nz/transport/wellington/plan

sample text:
“So Steven Joyce has just made a political decision to piss your taxes down a hole to subsidise the building of the Transmission Gully motorway. He’s bought a series of arguments that are sheer bullshit. Why? Because I saw the evidence a few years ago when they were rejected then. Firstly, there is the nonsense that somehow Wellington needs a motorway with a huge viaduct to “connect” it to Kapiti and Horowhenua in the event of a major earthquake. Quite what Wellingtonians will gain from this is unclear when:
- There is only one bridge over the Waikanae River;
- There is only one bridge over the Otaki River;
- There is only one route along a faultline from the Hutt to Wellington city;
- Transmission Gully itself is on a faultline.
$1.5 billion is an expensive insurance policy.”