by frog
Over the last few weeks it’s become evident just how big the gulf is between what local and central government want for Auckland’s transport systems.
First, the Regional Land Transport Committee published their list of priorities for Auckland transport which – by putting public transport projects in the top three positions and the Puhoi to Wellsford motorway as the 15th most important project – was almost directly opposed to the government’s priorities.
Then there was the flare up between Mike Lee and Steven Joyce over the (alleged) need for more planning to justify the need for rail in Auckland. And finally, both candidates for Super-Mayor spoke out in favour of early completion of a CBD rail loop – plans Joyce was quick to try and discourage.
Joyce seems slightly surprised by the depth of support at local government level for public transport projects in Auckland, particularly by right-wing politicans like John Banks. But he shouldn’t be.
Banks wants to win the next election. And like most local government politicians he reads the surveys that councils carry out of their residents each year. These surveys show that what most Aucklanders want prioritized is better public transport infrastructure – not more roads. For example:
- ARC’s latest Environmental Awareness Survey – a representative survey of 1600 residents – found that while 87% of respondents agreed that better public transport would make it easier to get around the region only 49% believed more roads would help.
- Manukau City Council’s latest Citizen Perception Survey of 510 residents also found that more than twice as many respondents (22%) saw improving public transport as a key issue for the council to focus on than saw improving or providing more roads (8%) as a priority.
Perhaps Joyce will soon be looking at our Auckland Transport Plan for 2008 searching for some ideas to get him back in favour with the Jaffas. I certainly hope so!
Published in Environment & Resource Management by frog on Thu, October 22nd, 2009
Tags: Auckland, local government, public transport, transport funding
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
It is sad that Auckland is destined to remain tightly tethered to a small city 900km away for decision-making around most of it’s transport decisions. If this were not the case, I’d say some far more normative decision-making would have occured many decades ago and Auckland would have a much better transit infrastructure alongside roading.
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There are two problems with this survey and they should be well known to anyone in the busy.
The first is the public good problem.
If you ask people on the street whether they watched the 6.00 TV news or Big Boobs on Baywatch 99% say they watch the news.
But if you ask what they watched at 6.00 last night they will say “Did you see the size of those boobs on Baywatch.” This was an environmental awareness survey and all the questions were about having the right attitude to the environment and the work of the ARC.
The other problem came through in surveys we did in the sixties. We asked Aucklanders if they wanted money spent on public transport or more roads. Most said more public transport.
But when we followed up by saying “would you use it?” They said no.
When asked why they wanted money spent on public transport if they did not intend to use it they replied ‘It would free up the roads so I could drive to my destination faster.”
It’s called the second order question. No one should based their decision making on a first order question alone.
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>> Most said more public transport.
But when we followed up by saying “would you use it?” They said no.
When asked why they wanted money spent on public transport if they did not intend to use it they replied ‘It would free up the roads so I could drive to my destination faster.”
An interesting result, but: What percentage of respondents provided this countervailing second order answer? Also, by the same token, one can also posit at least some of the ‘anti public transport’ respondents claiming that they want more use of private transport in order to free up room on the bus/train.
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The big flaw in your argument Owen is the fact that over the past few years public transport patronage in Auckland has increased significantly while traffic flows have stagnated. So, yeah, well Aucklanders actually are using public transport in increasing numbers.
Joyce is really getting isolated here with his roads-fetishism. I wonder what he’s going to think of the Regional Land Transport Strategy the ARC is due to release in a few days for consultation. I reckon it’s Auckland’s best transport strategy in 60 years.
More thoughts on the RLTS: http://transportblog.co.nz/2009/10/21/2010-2040-rlts-finally-a-good-tr ansport-strategy/
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