by frog
Labour has used the excuse that high oil prices are curbing demand, so we don’t have to bring transport into the ETS just yet. New figures released in the States support the claim of reduced car travel. From a USA Today article:
Americans drove 22 billion fewer miles from November through April than during the same period in 2006-07, the biggest such drop since the Iranian revolution led to gasoline supply shortages in 1979-80.
The numbers released Wednesday may reflect more than a temporary attitude change in consumers toward high gas prices, Transportation Secretary Mary Peters said. Previously, she said, “people might change their pattern for a short period of time, but it almost always bounced back very quickly. We’re not seeing that now.”
The decline in total miles traveled, though only 1%, means that many drivers are cutting back far more because the number of drivers and vehicles grows by 1% to 2% a year. Americans are driving about the same number of miles as in 2005, when the USA had 8 million fewer people, according to a USA TODAY analysis of Federal Highway Administration data. The declines are sharpest on rural roads, indicating that people are cutting back on long-distance and vacation trips.
This is all good in climate change terms, as what we are seeing is a decline in discretionary travel. The problem, of course, is that oil prices are only going to continue rising, particularly in NZ. We are simply not ready here, as we have not felt the full impact of the price rises the way the Americans have.
Our exchange rate with the US is 32% above it’s long-term historic average since it was floated in March 1985. When we start trending towards that average, which economists say we will inevitably do, petrol prices here are going to go through the roof, even if world oil prices hold steady or decline somewhat.
Published in Economy, Work, & Welfare by frog on Mon, June 23rd, 2008
Tags: climate change, denial, economy, exchange rate, oil, peak oil, petrol
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
It’s hard to know the truth in the oil industry as there are so many liars in key roles.
*IF* the present high oil prices are a speculative bubble, THEN we may see petrol prices drop when it bursts.
*IF* the gap between supply and demand is so narrow as to make such speculative manipulations possible, THEN the bubble may not burst unless and until it is pricked either by regulatory changes OR an influx of oil to the market too large for the speculators to buy up.
*IF* demand really does exceed absolute capacity to supply, as some have estimated, THEN petrol prices may not come down much, if at all and may instead continue to rise.
*IF* NZ’s food commodities remain in demand and paying high prices, THEN our currency may not fall against the US dollar as much as some expect it to.
It all depends on which of these IFs is actually real.
It’s worth noting we have been falling against major currencies OTHER than the US dollar for several months. The focus on the US/Kiwi dollar relation ship obscures the fact the US dollar has been falling against almost everyone for some years now. Do we really want to join that downward spiral?
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Of course, readers of this blog know well how reliable economic predictions are…
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Indeedy. It is possible the tankation of the US dollar is not a “blip” or “spike” or some such term, but is a structural readjustment…
Ironically, its the countries with traditionally the highest fuel prices caused by large duty charges that have the least relative pain from fuel price rises, as only a small proportionof the overall pump price is related to underlying fuel prices. Countiries where there is little or no duty get the full pain of the rise.
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then of course..there is this..
http://whoar.co.nz/2008/obama-details-plan-to-tax-excess-oil-company-profits/
(just in case the green party is looking for ‘circuit-breaking’/resonating campaign themes..?..
..eh..?..)
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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The decline in rural travel is probably because it is easier to improve trip planning in rural areas and combine many activities into one trip.
We have no congestion and don’t have to drive round looking for parking.
I don’t commute and hence have more flexibility.
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Ironically, its the countries with traditionally the highest fuel prices caused by large duty charges that have the least relative pain from fuel price rises, as only a small proportionof the overall pump price is related to underlying fuel prices.
Plus the large-duty countries tend to have better public transport and more efficient vehicles (a 5l/100km car will only see half the incremental pain of a 10l/100km car, ignoring GST).
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“The decline in rural travel is probably because it is easier to improve trip planning in rural areas and combine many activities into one trip.”
So Owen McShane doesn’t believe in the impact of pricing mechanisms on demand.
just for you Owen
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Frog
I don’t think OUR dollar is going to fall to its “historic average” with respect to the US dollar. I think that low level was the anomaly, and that as the inflation Chickens, Rocs, Pterodactyls and Supersonic Pigs released by the Fed come home to roost, the US Dollar is going to see nothing but downside pressure.
That isn’t to say things won’t get worse here, just that they won’t reflect that added negative that a free-falling NZ $ could add. We actually earn the money we spend (mostly). The US hasn’t done that since Moby Dick was a minnow. Reserve currency my left nut. I doubt that it will come back up before we reach par with it.
respectfully
BJ
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Roger nome:
Don’t get it.
Trip planning is way of reducing the cost of fuel and we are seeing a drop in demand for fuel because high prices are encouraging more efficient use.
There is also the impact of perception. When fuel prices are high one is probaly more enraged by traffic lights and congestion because the fuel being burnt is being wasted.
Overall, I believe high priced petrol is yet another force for decentralisation rather than centralisation as so many appear to presume.
Why would anyone move back towards the centre of the city because of rising fuel prices unless they had a specialist job only found in the CBD. Most don’t.
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Owen – while I agree with the jist of your comment, I would argue that we will see a RE-centralisation. Into both the cities (that were pre-automobile and thus usable) and into the medium sized so-called rural townships. (The one clobbered by big box retail) It’s the suburban sprawl that is going to come to an end, or turn into ghetto. The overall effect will be one of decentralisation.
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I have to agree with several posters; I don’t think that the NZ Dollar will hit its long term average against the US Dollar – indeed, I don’t think that we will be heading below US60c for a very long time yet. The problem is that the United States Federal Reserve are following the same policies that they did in the 1970s that caused massive inflation; and inflation has had the most influence on currency levels over the last 100 years (something like 95% of long term currency movement was to do with inflation over the 20th Century).
Also, if you haven’t noticed, we are moving back to average levels against other currencies; we are back below A$0.80, hovering around the €0.48 mark, and in the lower ₤0.30s. It is just the US Dollar that is the anomoly, and that is because of their high inflation policy.
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“Owen – while I agree with the jist of your comment, I would argue that we will see a RE-centralisation. Into both the cities (that were pre-automobile and thus usable) and into the medium sized so-called rural townships. (The one clobbered by big box retail) It’s the suburban sprawl that is going to come to an end, or turn into ghetto. The overall effect will be one of decentralisation.”
I don’t think that we will see the end of suburbanisation; remember that the suburbs first came into being in the 19th Century with the advent of the railway line, and that suburbs were cemented in the public consciousness in the early 20th Century with the arrival of the electric tram. What we would probably see is that there wouldn’t be the wide dispersal of workplaces, which is in my opinion the larger problem, and that would enable and encourage more railway and other public transport development.
Let us not forget that in a post-oil environment (if it occurs), it would still be possible for someone to live in Newcastle and commute to Sydney, or live in Gympie and commute to Brisbane. This is in spite of the large distances involved (>150km in both cases).
Nothing can escape economic reality; generally, people that are wealthier tend to prefer suburban living to central city living and that would still occur, it is just that the concentric rings (von Thunen’s theory) around the city will not be “stretched out” by roadways as much as at the present.
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Houston Mayor Gauges Impact of Traffic
Morning Edition, June 20, 2008 · Runaway gas prices have prompted talk of alternatives to cars — even in the ultimate oil boom town of Houston. Mayor Bill White discusses the city’s traffic congestion and other car-related issues.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91724121
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U.S. House Debates Smart Growth
“Goldberg and Winkleman spoke to the virtues of promoting denser, better-planned cities with good mass transit and pedestrian-friendly design. Goldberg noted that families in areas where you can get by with one or no car save an average of $6,000 a year, not to mention reducing their personal emissions.
Winkleman noted that pretty much any savings created by the increase in fuel efficiency standards laid out in last year’s energy bill would be more than negated by the ever-increasing number of miles Americans travel each year.”
http://www.planetizen.com/node/33618
I can see some of Owens points in so far as people living in the country may be self sufficient without being on a 4ha site as long as they don’t have to commute (retired, working from home?).
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Owen McShane
Reckless suburban sprawl became possible because of cheap fuel (and the automobile (and profit-driven property developers hijacking regional/district and city councils). If not for cheap fuel the average car trip , involving 1.2 people in Auckland (read property developer-lead planning) wouldn’t be possible.
The more spread-out the development planning is, the less efficient the public transport (less passengers per km traveled), and the more kms traveled in the average journey private car journey (much of the commuting done goes from suburb to CBD). This means a more oil consumed.
So it follows that, as oil becomes more expensive, there will be ever more economic rationality to stop suburban expansion, and start making planing denser. This all depends on the public’s ability to wrestle control of the planing process from the profit-seeking property developers, or central government’s will to curtail run-away suburban sprawl.
If they aren’t stopped, ever more of our income will be spent liquid fuel – which is of course why the property developers and the oil companies work so closely together to corrupt the political process/ keep suburban sprawl happening.
Owen McShane is a stooge for these crooks – he even promotes the cause of global-warming denialism despite having little or no understanding of the science. What a fraud you are.
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over the years he has also received funding/wh.y. from the climate-change denial groups funded by exxon mobil..
the man has np credibility..
he stands naked..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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Johnston:
“It is just the US Dollar that is the anomoly, and that is because of their high inflation policy.”
Given their extremely low interest rates, the US has had remarkably low inflation over the last 5 years.
http://static.flickr.com/30/42606600_402f565017.jpg
http://www.hbosplc.com/media/includes/Interest%20rate%20trends.jpg
I do agree that the USD isn’t going to spring back any time soon though. USDs held in foreign currency reserves are under pressure, as countries increasingly trade in Euros rather than USDs
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roger nome. Less than 20% of urban travel is from surburbs to CBD. Most is within the same suburb, hence the very low average distance per trip.
It is highly unlikely that reckless suburban sprawl was helped along by profit-driven property developers hijacking regional/district and city councils. The quarter acre paradise happened when most people lived in boroughs and countries and it was encouraged by both National and Labour. Politicians have there own “profit” motive that leads to stupid short term policies.
You seem to be suggesting that if it wasn’t for evil property developers our parents would have chosen to live in tower block housing estates. I suggest to you that the constant bitching about in-fill and townhouses tesll us who wants old fashioned low density and who wants profitable high density.
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“Reckless suburban sprawl became possible because of cheap fuel (and the automobile (and profit-driven property developers hijacking regional/district and city councils). If not for cheap fuel the average car trip , involving 1.2 people in Auckland (read property developer-lead planning) wouldn’t be possible.”
Really Roger Nome? In 1998, the Gold Coast Line opened to its present length when Robina Station was opened. At the time, it was surrounded by fields and most people did not expect that the rail line would be highly popular (it was designed for half-hourly frequencies during the peak, and hourly frequencies off peak). Ten years later, the line has needed to be duplicated and extra rolling stock purchased to sustain a fifteen minute peak frequency and half hourly off peak frequency (which has been in existence for some years now). Robina Station is now surrounded by housing and businesses. While I do agree that some of the Gold Coast’s development has been vehicular driven, nevertheless, the construction of the rail line played its part as well.
You can very easily get sprawl courtesy of railway lines as well as with roads. If the Gold Coast example isn’t good enough, then look at NSWs Central Coast – that has virtually become the suburbs of Sydney a mere twenty years after the line to Newcastle was electrified.
“The more spread-out the development planning is, the less efficient the public transport (less passengers per km traveled), and the more kms traveled in the average journey private car journey (much of the commuting done goes from suburb to CBD). This means a more oil consumed.”
Fair enough point, however, bear in mind that not much of the commuting goes from suburb to CBD. If Auckland had a situation where that was true, then there would be plenty of demand for a good public transport system. The fact that we achieve overcrowded trains with 10% employment share in the CBD tells me something.
“So it follows that, as oil becomes more expensive, there will be ever more economic rationality to stop suburban expansion, and start making planing denser. This all depends on the public’s ability to wrestle control of the planing process from the profit-seeking property developers, or central government’s will to curtail run-away suburban sprawl. ”
Take a trip down Dominion Road. Notice the houses in the area, they are all on quarter acre sections, and guess what they were designed around
THE TRAMWAY!!!!!
Just because oil comes to an end does not mean that the suburbanisation process comes to an end; heavy and light rail can be as much of a suburbanising influence as the motor car was.
“If they aren’t stopped, ever more of our income will be spent liquid fuel – which is of course why the property developers and the oil companies work so closely together to corrupt the political process/ keep suburban sprawl happening. ”
How come? Brisbane has a population half the density of Auckland, yet has ten times the rail patronage, and I am guessing five times the bus patronage. Is isn’t density that matters, it is where employment is and it also depends on the provision of services. Brisbane had an extensive rail service built in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, and which was electrified between 1979 and 1988, and naturally, it’s rail share is higher because of the service provision.
“Given their extremely low interest rates, the US has had remarkably low inflation over the last 5 years.”
My apologies; when I meant a high inflation policy, I meant that they have become more reckless in their management of the money supply.
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roger nome says: Owen McShane is a stooge for these crooks – he even promotes the cause of global-warming denialism despite having little or no understanding of the science.
I owuld go further than that Roger. These days that is Owen’s primary obejective – President or Chariman of the International Space Cadets’ Coalition, or whatever it is called.
I have several times challenged him on the science re greenhouse emissions in the last week or so, both here and on kiwiblog, and he hasn’t come up with any credible response.
john-ston – I think the difference between rail (or light rail – trams) and roading re urban sprawl is that with rail it tends to be unidirectional. The urban area expands in one direction, but tends to infill it there are planning restaints on expansion because it just takes too long to travel huge distances on a rail or tram line.
Roading, however, lets people travel wherever they want, in any direction, so negates the constraints on unlimited sprawl that heavy or light rail provide by keeping urban development close to the rail corridors.
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“Less than 20% of urban travel is from surburbs to CBD.”
Really? Source? Are you taking in terms of kms or number of individual trips?
“The quarter acre paradise happened when most people lived in boroughs and countries and it was encouraged by both National and Labour.”
I take issue especially with the second point.
http://www.nzsses.auckland.ac.nz/conference/2007/papers/HARRIS-Lost%20City.pdf -
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“john-ston – I think the difference between rail (or light rail – trams) and roading re urban sprawl is that with rail it tends to be unidirectional. The urban area expands in one direction, but tends to infill it there are planning restaints on expansion because it just takes too long to travel huge distances on a rail or tram line.
Roading, however, lets people travel wherever they want, in any direction, so negates the constraints on unlimited sprawl that heavy or light rail provide by keeping urban development close to the rail corridors.”
That is certainly not how Auckland developed prior to the motor vehicle age. Auckland didn’t develop as a series of corridors during the tram age; it developed in a multi-directional manner. Almost all Western cities behaved in that manner. The only era where you had unidirectional development was in the 19th Century with the railway age; the tram age saw the start of “infill development,” as the gaps between the railway stations were closed. Anyway, if you have a well designed railway network, you wouldn’t have any gaps between development.
Another thing is that while it may take a while to travel large distances on a rail or tram line, people are more likely to commute for longer on those forms of transport. People commute everyday from Gympie to Brisbane, from Newcastle to Sydney, from Bunbury to Perth and from Bendigo and Traralgon to Melbourne by rail – this is in spite of these city pairs being >150km. I don’t think that as many people would be keen to commute such a long distance by private vehicle.
While roading lets people travel where they want, I doubt that it has as much influence on the development of housing location as you are suggesting. On the other hand, it has plenty of influence on workplace location as it becomes much easier to have a workplace in a dispersed location – that is what makes the public transport provision that much harder.
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john-ston
I have to echo toad’s comments. Look at the Hutt Valley development. It was planned around the rail tracks – so is long and narrow – meaning public transport is efficient.
Now take Auckland – the planning was all over the place after the 1940s, so it’s all over the place with little in the way public-transport-oriented vision.
So maybe it would be more accurate to say that with more expensive fuel, it will be increasingly economically rational to return to the 1940s, Hutt Valley (where i grew up) style planing.
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Kevyn says:
“You seem to be suggesting that if it wasn’t for evil property developers our parents would have chosen to live in tower block housing estates. I suggest to you that the constant bitching about in-fill and townhouses tesll us who wants old fashioned low density and who wants profitable high density.”
The bitching isn’t so much about infill but how it is carried out. Think big garage on lawn, house with paling fence and house down the back. Consider all the compromises to good design when that is done; wall area, extra driveway wasted side areas, roof ares etc.
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Kevyn:
“You seem to be suggesting that if it wasn’t for evil property developers our parents would have chosen to live in tower block housing estates.”
nah – just that there would be more cheap medium-density housing, and planning around rail corridors to provide a cheap and convenient means of getting around. Of course both of these things would have meant lower profits for developers, oil companies and automobile companies.
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“I have to echo toad’s comments. Look at the Hutt Valley development. It was planned around the rail tracks – so is long and narrow – meaning public transport is efficient.
Now take Auckland – the planning was all over the place after the 1940s, so it’s all over the place with little in the way public-transport-oriented vision.
So maybe it would be more accurate to say that with more expensive fuel, it will be increasingly economically rational to return to the 1940s, Hutt Valley (where i grew up) style planing.”
Alright, I have looked at the Hutt Valley Development. You forget the other reason why it is so efficient – there are hills on either side which restricts development to a very narrow corridor; that helps now, does it not? Indeed, if Wellington wasn’t surrounded by so many hills, I don’t think it would have any rail service today.
Yes, I know that planning went off the rails, so to speak in the 1940s, however, bear in mind that the quarter acre dream was already alive and well in Auckland. Look at Sandringham, Balmoral, Mount Eden, Point Chevalier and Westmere – all these were tram era suburbs and all these had quarter acre sections and all were developed in the 1920s. You didn’t need the advent of the motor vehicle to get suburbanisation, the tram was enough to do that. Also, in the case of Auckland, it wouldn’t take much to adjust our development for public transport; most of West and South Auckland have the North Auckland and North Island Main Trunk lines bisecting them, a couple of tram lines could be built on the North Shore, much of the old isthmus tram network could be rebuilt, with extensions to Howick, Otahuhu and Waikowhai, and a new line to St. Heliers – not that I am advocating something like that, but the point is that Auckland is not doomed.
In fact, even had the motor car not come about, I do think that Auckland would look similar to what it looks like today, perhaps with the exception that the CBD would have far more jobs in it. There would almost certainly have been the further development of the railway towns, and extensions to the tram lines. Buses would have enabled the railway stations and tram lines to have a far wider reach.
“nah – just that there would be more cheap medium-density housing, and planning around rail corridors to provide a cheap and convenient means of getting around. Of course both of these things would have meant lower profits for developers, oil companies and automobile companies.”
Alright, for starters, you are accusing the oil companies, the automobile companies and developers of being in cahoots – that has as much truth as the sky being black. Developers would develop as high-density housing as they could, since they would generate more profit from it – what the problem is that until recent years, there has not been the demand for such properties and so those properties would not sell. The other problem is that banks are less likely to lend on medium and high density dwellings; you can only get a 50% value mortgage on an apartment for instance.
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Here,here:
“If developers were allowed to pull down the Sacre Coeur you can be damn sure they would. And if they could build lots of tiny apartments on the razed site, you can be sure they would do that too. And all for profit. But they don’t. Because they are not allowed to! Look how beautiful Sydney’s heritage areas are! And Melbourne! Another French friend came to my old home in Devonport and said “Ah, la style Creole? as she looked about. And it is ‘la style Creole’, so why is this style of architecture so valued in New Orleans and so despised here?”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/blogs/abouttown/2008/04/01/ugly-us/
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john-ston
Say what you will, but National has preferred automobile-centered urban development over public-transport-centered development.
Your proposition, that both approaches end up with identical housing densities is ludicrous.
If you read the book you will learn that property developers and other industrialists used the National party to take the country in that direction in the 1950s.
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This book:
http://books.scoop.co.nz/proudly-partisan-nz-history/
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“Say what you will, but National has preferred automobile-centered urban development over public-transport-centered development.”
I am not disputing that.
“Your proposition, that both approaches end up with identical housing densities is ludicrous.”
How is it ludicrous. Alright, you probably haven’t heard about this, but you had the Halcrow-Thomas Report of 1950, which proposed an extensive rail network for Auckland. It included a line from Meadowbank to Papatoetoe via Howick; a line to the North Shore; a line from Avondale to Whenuapai via Te Atatu and several other lines within the New Lynn to Otahuhu area. With that alone, suburban development would have become more viable on the North Shore and in West Auckland. The existing NIMT would have enabled development in South Auckland, and the Howick Line would have seen East bound development.
If you consider Sydney and Melbourne, which had extensive public transport corridors and retained much of it (except for Sydney’s trams), you still had a very strong focus toward suburban development. Overseas, it did not really matter whether or not it was a public transport based or motorway based system, you still had suburban development.
Furthermore, remember the geography of Auckland – it has to develop along a narrow corridor, so whether or not you have roads or rail, your pattern will almost certainly be the same.
“If you read the book you will learn that property developers and other industrialists used the National party to take the country in that direction in the 1950s.”
Chris Trotter is biased, so I would take his comments with a grain of salt. Also, taking New Zealand in the direction it was taken was almost certainly inevitable.
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john-ston:
You seem to think only one way was ever available, yet this is patenetly not true. Denser planning, centered around public transport infrastructure was often suggested, but was rejected by National governments and councils from the 1950s onwards.
http://www.nzsses.auckland.ac.nz/conference/2007/papers/HARRIS-Lost%20City.pdf
Also, you should check Trotter’s sources (Work from the above author is one of them) – he may be biased, but his sources here are solid.
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Against my better judgement I’m going to leap in here, because is it rare that you get a comment which is so open to clear contradiction. Thank you Mr Roger Gnome.
> Reckless suburban sprawl became possible because of cheap fuel (and the automobile (and profit-driven property developers hijacking regional/district and city councils).
Actually this is quite interesting. The original impetus for crushing everyone together was probably security – i.e. you might get attacked if you lived outside the city gates, and it was expensive to build a really long wall.
But crush got a strong boost with the industrial revolution because of the invention of steam power. While this was a wonderful new technology, it had one drawback: the engines were huge and expensive. It made sense to locate everything around the supply of coal (the end of the railway line). Within a factory, it made sense to put the machines as close as possible to the drive shaft of the stream engine. This resulted in multi-storey factors which were common in those days.
These days, with electricity, private cars and the Internet, there is very little reason to centralise. Factories are single storey and are located in the sticks.
Environmentalists essentially are putting up a straw man when they say that private transport to inner cities is ‘unsustainable’. The word needs definition anyway, but I’ll ignore that for the moment. The reason it is completely ‘sustainable’, is that cities are decentralising. Look at ChCh – the jobs are being added in the suburbs not in the centre. The morning rush-hour is worse on Main North Rd (suburbs) than in Durham St (centre).
Talking of public transport, it only works when people are crushed together. Without the crush you need massive subsidies to make it economic (as ChCh). And strangely public transport created the London crush, not the other way around.
> The more spread-out the development planning is, the less efficient the public transport (less passengers per km traveled), and the more kms traveled in the average journey private car journey (much of the commuting done goes from suburb to CBD). This means a more oil consumed.
See above, you are incorrect in your assumption.
> So it follows that, as oil becomes more expensive, there will be ever more economic rationality to stop suburban expansion, and start making planing denser. This all depends on the public’s ability to wrestle control of the planing process from the profit-seeking property developers, or central government’s will to curtail run-away suburban sprawl.
By ‘public’ I think you mean bureaucratic planner. In fact you hope to ban people from building where they like, against their will. This is not the public at all, it is environmentalists, and it is one of environmentalists’ most pernicious sins.
One person’s profit-seeking developer is another person’s new home supplier. Sprawl is far far better than crush. I’ve lived in both and there is simply no comparison in terms of quality of life, trees, open space, etc.
> Owen McShane is a stooge for these crooks – he even promotes the cause of global-warming denialism despite having little or no understanding of the science. What a fraud you are.
I have the utmost respect for Mr McShane. For years now he has patiently and carefully set out the arguments as to why environmentalists are wrong about nearly everything. He is an asset to the country, and I look forward to him getting official credit for his service in due course.
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I have just read an interesting article from the UK regarding getting to grips with the big challenges of our future around climate and energy. Obviously this debate will be a bit beyond those that think oil is regenerated from rock, or that global warming is a great swindle, but I hope it might generate some decent debate about this from a NZ perspective.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/20/mackay_on_carbon_free_uk/
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“The Optimist”
You just completely failed to make a coherent argument. None of your ‘points’ need rebutting.
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Roger Nome you just gave me another 30mins sleep, cheers!
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Welcome optimist. Your problem is I’ve already invalidated every point you’ve made and can’t be bothered reiterating/humoring you.
Otherwise sleep well
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Another load of comments that look at where we have bben and aportioning blame.
Talk about walking backwards into the future!
I really does not matter which government did what and when.
Political point scoring is what you are engaged in.
What are the plans for the future? What are the PT options being explored? Where is the budget? What are the infastructure developments plans to support electrification expansion for PT and possibly private tranport?
Will funding for the PT and supporting infastructure come from government cashflow (higher taxation), borrowing, or will Public-Private Partnerships be an answer?
Think about the future and leave the political point scoring in the past.
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Good morning Gerrit,
I think the arguments about the past point to the future. If you understand the history of transport then you are better able to make choices in the present.
Planners are part of the problem, not the solution. By planning they force people to live where they don’t want to, to live at a higher density than they want to, and reduce peoples’ over-all quality of life. Really we need to move away from planning and back to more of a free market.
Just one justification of this is financial. Does it really make sense for a young married couple to spend their entire working lives just paying off the mortgage on the LAND that their house sits on? This is the case in most parts of New Zealand now. It is a criminal waste of human effort. That money could be used to start a business, buy more electricity or buy some mercury-filled light bulbs.
Governments ask why NZers are so adicted to property – one reason is that planners have systematically worked to increase the price of land, thus benefiting those who own more land than they need.
Environmentalists talk about public transport as if it is a godsend. At least in ChCh it is expensive, noisy, uncomfortable and doesn’t go where you want to go. Plannings solve these probems by subsidies and trying to force people to live and work where the buses are. This is not free choice – this is just state control.
I would like to see much more reliance on private transport and more investment in roads. I very much hope that environmentalists can be removed from our councils, as they are doing terrible damage to our city streets in their effort to bring about the increased traffic they warn of.
Above all, widespread public transport is an admission of failure, an admission that the way we want things to be (everyone free to buzz around in a car when and where they want) is not possible. The reasons it is not possible are normally to do with bad government.
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Optimist,
Fully agree that we look at past planning mistakes. What gets me is this reference to Labour this National that, and what they did in 1940, 1950, etc.
I favour the where are we now, where do we want to get to, how do we get there, approach to planning.
Would not matter if it was strategic planning of how New Zealand would be functioning and funded in 2020. Or the transport system available to us in that year.
Lets debate where we are going, not where we have been.
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Hi Gerrit,
My point is that the nature of ‘planning’ is that it creates ‘planning mistakes’. Planning is pretty close to a mistake in itself. The problem with the word planning, is that it now means to create a plan and force people to fit in with it. Planning *should* mean trying to predict what people will do and doing what you can to fit in with that.
Instead of planning, we should perhaps call it infrastructure building.
In terms of predictions…
Fashion and technology point towards electric cars at the moment but the method of propulsion won’t make a big difference to cities. Technology will eventually allow cars to drive themselves (perhaps by 2025 or so) and eventually when cars can organise a wireless networking amongst themselves, traffic lights will be able to be switched off, lanes narrowed and closer following distanced introduced. That will massively increase existing road capacity.
The only question is whether we will have cheap flying cars by then, or not. If so, then that could cause a more marked change in housing patterns as you can imagine.
For transport, the future certainly looks exciting.
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The Energy Bulletins been off-line for an upgrade. Not knowing much running a web site I’m wondering why it takes so long?
http://www.energybulletin.net/
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“Our exchange rate with the US is 32% above it’s long-term historic average since it was floated in March 1985. When we start trending towards that average, which economists say we will inevitably do, petrol prices here are going to go through the roof, even if world oil prices hold steady or decline somewhat.”
You confuse two things.
First our exchange rate is high compared with a long-term average of our trading partner’s currencies. That suggests our dollar is high and will fall back in time.
But that doesn’t mean that the NZD/USD rate in particular will move back to its long-term average in any great hurry. I know people like to look at their rate vs the USD as it’s the standard currency of comparison, but it can be quite misleading.
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“Owen McShane is a stooge for these crooks – he even promotes the cause of global-warming denialism despite having little or no understanding of the science. What a fraud you are.”
roger,
Though I have sympathy for your sentiments I feel that this phrasing is overly strong. Please refrain from calling people stooges and frauds.
I know your comments are very mild compared to what is seen on-line elsewhere: but it would be very sad if this comment section degenerated into a sewer like Kiwiblog’s comment section.
i
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Big numbers sound great don’t they!
This is a reduction of circe 1.5 miles per week per person. Not a vast distance, and easily achieved by putting the kids on the school bus one day a week rather than taking them in the V8 SUV.
a national equivelant here (6 million miles) doesn’t sound anywhere near as good and wouldn’t make a headline I think.
What would be interesting would be a monitor of the average speed of traffic on a main road into and out of each of our major cities at (say) 8:30 am and 5:30 pm. Every time it speeds up, we are saving fuel, every time we slow down we are burning more. The reality is that miles travelled doesn’t mean a thing without some relativity to energy consumption!
HAppy Daze
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I’m with the decentralisers – even though Mr McShane is one of them. I come from a completely different perspective though.
As all forms of energy becomes relatively more expensive, we will have to, over time, evacuate the cities and say goodbye to urban sprawl. My belief is that we will relocalise and become much more self-sufficient, growing more of our own food, adopting alternative energy for our vehicles such as wood-gas, locally produced bio-fuels etc., electric vehicles, and re-creating local employment (particularly in the food industry), recovering lost skills and in every way becoming less dependent on our addiction to travel in all it’s forms.
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“..roger,
Though I have sympathy for your sentiments I feel that this phrasing is overly strong. Please refrain from calling people stooges and frauds..”
wot..!..we have to be ‘polite’ to the dissemblers of the climate-change fiction..
the fiction that is hurting our planet/sending us all to hell in a handbasket..?
you might have hit on one of the main problems in/of the greens..
icehawk..
being ‘too polite’..
when do you get feckin’ angry..?..icehawk..?
when the water’s lapping under your chin..?
mcshane is a leading name in the lies-peddling denial industry..
should we now look at how exxon mobil have ‘funded’ large hunks of that ‘denial’ industry..?
would that get you ‘angry’..?
possibly even spilling over into ‘impoliteness’..?..
heaven forbid..!
get some fire in your belly..!..icehawk..
and the rest of you over-polite greens..
you have to be warriors..!
for feck sake..!
this isn’t a feckin’ tea-party..!
eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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I agree with Optimist that the past is instructive for the future. I disagree that too much planning is the problem however. If there was no planning there would be no sewerage system, and only ad-hoc coordination happening on a systemic level, which would mean ridiculous inefficiencies everywhere.
“By planning they force people to live where they don’t want to, to live at a higher density than they want to, and reduce peoples’ over-all quality of life.”
Ludicrous. Density and quality of life can and do go together. Higher density makes it easier and cheaper to get from point A to point B, using public transport (no being stuck in traffic for half an hour – ala Auckland). Furthermore, if you create beautiful public spaces surrounding and within the densely planned housing it can off-set any tension caused by living close to your neighbors. ie Dunedin is NZ’s most beautiful city IMO. It’s densely planned, has a green-belt and numerous parks, and apart from the cold is a joy to live in.
Then there’s the oil over-consumption problem associated with random suburban sprawl. Planning in Europe is usually denser than in the US, and they consequently have much better public transport systems, and use only half as much oil on a per-capita basis (of course less use of oil for electricity generation, plus higher taxes on fuel, and inefficient automobiles contribute to Europe’s superiority in this respect).
Also – the so called “street car” suburbs of the 1910s-1920s were densely planned, very walkable, and with beautiful public spaces i.e. plazas, parks etc. Contrast that with modern-day suburbia which is characterised by sparse development, not conducive to public transport, often with no footpaths and endless cal-de-sacs (not very walkable), and with ugly privatised public spaces dominated by massive malls/multi-national retail chains. People on this thread have been trying to draw comparisons between the two. There is none.
Then we have the dismissal of the idea that big oil and the automobile industry have colluded to turn NZ into an energy hungry nation of one person per journey car users. Never mind the fact that Standard Oil, General Motors, Fire-stone were convicted for colluding to destroy light-rail across the US. They literally bought it up and scrapped it so people were forced to buy more of their products (see 12:15 in “The End of Suburbia“). Are we really to believe that these sort of industrial pressures have never been brought to bare upon our political process (particularly considering the way suburban development went in in the 1950s, mimicking the situation in the US)?
Random suburban sprawl has been called “the greatest miss-allocation of wealth in history” – because the sparser the planning has got the more energy has been required – and energy is just going to get ever more expensive. So the US and NZ’s situation is going to get ever more economically inefficient.
Electricity supply, to make up oil decline after peak would probably need to triple in the next 20-30 years, otherwise getting around in a car could cost many times what it does now, making it simply untenable for most people. So who hands up who thinks that electricity supply can grow like that? Anyone get the feeling that we’ve painted ourselves into a corner?
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“You seem to think only one way was ever available, yet this is patenetly not true. Denser planning, centered around public transport infrastructure was often suggested, but was rejected by National governments and councils from the 1950s onwards?
Auckland had already developed from Coast to Coast by the 1930s, so the only way was to develop along the isthmus in a westerly and southerly direction, it doesn’t matter whether the transport link was by road or by rail.
Further to that, do you think that people would have willingly moved into four storey flats or not? I highly doubt it; even in the 1920s, people had started to move into standalone houses on quarter acre sections, and this was in the era of the tram – no level of central planning would have made a difference. Why do you think house prices have soared so much in the Western world? It is because people demand standalone houses on sections, while governments are trying to force them into medium density housing.
“Talking of public transport, it only works when people are crushed together. Without the crush you need massive subsidies to make it economic (as ChCh). And strangely public transport created the London crush, not the other way around.?
Actually, it isn’t population density that makes public transport work; it is where the workplaces are. If Auckland had the percentage of jobs in its CBD that Wellington has (about 35%), then public transport here would be booming. You don’t need crush to make public transport work; look at Brisbane, it has half Auckland’s population density and yet has a very good public transport network so popular that Adelaide Street (one of the main streets in Brisbane’s CBD) is full of buses at peak hour, and Central Station has a train going through it virtually every minute during peak hour there.
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“even in the 1920s, people had started to move into standalone houses on quarter acre sections, and this was in the era of the tram”
Hardly – those suburbs housed a tiny minority of the population (i.e. professionals, some management and business owners) – and were actually quite densely planned compared to modern suburban sprawl. The real suburban explosion didn’t happen until the 1950s and 1960s (after National had legislated it).
And yes, I do think there’s plenty of demand for low-cost housing – i.e. there’s a 100,000 person supply short-fall in Auckland at the moment.
“Why do you think house prices have soared so much in the Western world?”
Easy – massive amounts of cheap cash sloshing around the world’s capital markets for the last 10 years (look at interest rates in the US over that period – 2-6% – it was insane). A lot of that ended up in property market speculation.
And the evidence? House prices are up to 50% higher than their rental values warrant. That’s the definition of a housing bubble.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/house-prices-world-highest/2005/11/30/1133311106610.html
“Actually, it isn’t population density that makes public transport work; it is where the workplaces are”
I get a bit tired of your endless random, un-sourced illogical claims. Denser planning means more passengers per kilometer. Really you shouldn’t need a diagram to understand this.
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May I suggest some of the contributors acquaint themselves with the facts about carbon footprints and location etc.
The standard (albeit inconvenient) reference is Consuming Australia. (google it).
To their surprise they found that the households with the largest GHG emissions were those living in high densities in inner city neighbourhoods. Lowest were in peri urban areas or rural areas.
The main driver is household income not location.
The shortest commuter trips and with the least congestion in major cities are on the edge. The majority of household vehicle trips are non work related.
the private vehicle fleet is more fuel efficient in whole of day use than the public transport fleet.
Households typically have more than one member so families are the experts in optimising the travel/location trade-offs. Trip to school is as important as trip to work and they may not be in the same direction.
All my research to date suggests that high fuel costs will be a further force for decentralisation. Time to stop worrying about urban sprawl. Its been over for several years.
The fact that rural users have been most able to reduce their vehicle miles is an indicator that high fuel costs will promote the ongoing decentralisation of our major cities.
You should read the recent demographic studies by Phil McDermott and especially his submission to the Commission on Auckland governance.
The last US census showed that the main centres of popultion growth are the micropolises – towns or regional centres of 30,000 to 50,000 reversing the trends of the post war years.
In twenty years Auckland metropolitan area will probably have fewer people than it does today.
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“Actually, it isn’t population density that makes public transport work; it is where the workplaces are?
This is correct and well researched. Residential density in New World cities has little correlation with public transport market share. The correlation is with major centres of employment with high job density.
The classic example is Los Angeles and New York. Los Angeles metropolitan area has a higher residential density than Metropolitan New York. But Metropolitan New York has a massive concentration of employment on Manhattan island. Hence the NY subway pays its way – one of the only two that do. (I think Chicago is the other).
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>>“Less than 20% of urban travel is from surburbs to CBD.? Really? Source?
http://www.petroltax.org.nz/PDF/AucklandTransportReview1976.PDF
1. Of the 2,000,000 trips generated daily in the Study Area, almost
two-thirds are made entirely within the sector of origin.
2. Approximately 353,000 trips, or 17% of the daily total generated,
have either an origin or destination within the CBD.
I have read the Harris paper previously and am well aware of it’s historical innaccuracies. No mention of the introduction of the Planning Act at the same time as capital gains was scrapped, and implying that the National Road Fund was completely new and was used to fund land transport.
http://www.petroltax.org.nz/documents.html
Would we have had any less sprawl under Labour’s state housing plans rather than under National’s cheap first home mortgages plan. Te Atatu and it’s motorway were planned by Labour (1946). National simply sold the development rights to Neal Housing.
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