Wellington should be leading New Zealand’s transport thinking - but we’ve been handed a timid Transport Strategy drafted by the Greater Wellington Regional Council that doesn’t hope for anything better than what we’ve got:

“We are concerned that the draft Regional Land Transport Strategy as presently worded adopts a business-as-usual approach rather recognising the urgent need for a more resilient and sustainable approach to transport…” [read more]

Option3’s submission to the draft Strategy points out what needs to change:

1. Everyone must be given real choices. Public transport, cyclist and pedestrian services and facilities have to be ahead of demand, and drive demand. It is no use telling people to use a bus if the bus doesn’t turn up when they need it. It is essential that no-one is unable to live an active and independent life without a car. Having a car should be an optional extra, not a necessity
2. Our region must be designed around “smart growth” concepts. Not just because that is essential if we are to have an economically efficient and sustainable region, but also because that’s the sort of place that people want to live.
3. People have to be encouraged to make modal shifts. The modal shift targets in the council’s documents (including the LTCCP) are mostly timid, and the draft RLTS admits that even these won’t be met. It is time to take serious steps to drive major modal shifts. The effect of recent fuel price increases shows that this is not impossible and perhaps not even difficult. Give people good public transport services, stop building new roads, restrict parking, introduce incentive pricing of congestion and parking, and modal shift will happen.
4. The transport system has to be made more sustainable. Key changes needed are increased use of renewable fuels, increased energy efficiency of vehicles, reduced emissions from vehicles, modal shift, and reduced land footprint of transport.
5. The transport system has to be made more equitable. The provision of real choices will do that, combined with fare structures that recognise the need to assist low income groups.
6. The transport system has to support public health objectives. The damming health impact study of the RLTS clearly identifies the changes that are needed to achieve this.

This documentary series looks at Auckland’s transport problems, and exposes a number of “urban myths” about why it cannot be changed.

Episode 1 includes interviews with Professor Peter Newman, Dr. Paul Mees and Jan Gehl. It reveals that Auckland is one of the most car dependent cities in the world - the result of 50 years of prioritising motorway construction over sustainable alternatives.

Episode 2 looks at the claim that Auckland is “too spread out” for sustainable transportation to work. The myth that Auckland is more dispersed than comparable cities is debunked; world-renowned transport and sustainable city guru, Professor Peter Newman, explains how Perth - a less dense city than Auckland - has built a successful and popular rail system; and the extent to which Finance Minister Michael Cullen has been captured by anti-rail roading lobbyists is revealed.

Episode 3 will look at the myth that Sustainable Transport ‘is uneconomic’. Thanks to Roland for the pointer to these.

Option3, with the support of a number of other like-minded groups, have just put out the following press release:

A broad coalition of groups today joined with Option3 to strongly criticise the draft Regional Land Transport Strategy, a summary of which is currently being sent to households across the region. Climate Defence Network, Cycle Aware Wellington, ECO, Heartbeat Wellington, Living Streets Aotearoa, Kapiti Transport Action Group, Option3, Transport 2000+ and the Wellington Civic Trust have joined together to express their concern at the lack of funding for new Public Transport services, walking and cycling.

These groups are concerned that new roads represent almost 90% of new infrastructure capacity funding, leaving very little for increasing sustainable transport alternatives.

There is $1.3B in Public Transport funding proposed in the draft strategy. However, that amount includes operating subsidies and deferred maintenance, such as train upgrades and long overdue replacement trains. Therefore, there is very little left for improvement to the overall public transport service quality.

In contrast, of the $2.7B proposed for roading, $1.7B is for new roads. These will directly contribute to continued growth in climate-damaging CO2 emissions.

“Just as we are being flooded with new reports detailing the need to act immediately to prevent further Climate Change, this draft strategy proposes to spend the majority of new capacity investment on projects that will increase our regional greenhouse gas emissions from transport,” said Ben Wilde, Option 3 spokesperson.

The groups believe that specific options are available to reverse the historic underinvestment in sustainable transport in the region and that Greater Wellington needs to make these more of a priority. Examples include fast-tracking already proposed improvements in rail and bus services; double tracking the rail line past Pukerua Bay; funding for workplace transport plans; development of walking maps; provision of secure public cycle parking; and completion of the cycle way between Wellington and the Hutt.

The groups are calling on individuals in the Wellington Region to make their concerns known to the Regional Council as part of the consultation process (details on how at http://www.option3.org.nz), and for Greater Wellington to make sustainable transport a priority for transport planning.

I must say that it has been very encouraging to have all these groups come together to express their concern at the direction that Greater Wellington is taking us. Let’s hope we can harness that concern to get some serious consideration for sustainable transport, and who knows, next year is a local body election year…

The Guardian Weekly had an interesting report this week on the successful removal of a traffic-jammed motorway from the heart of Seoul, South Korea. It’s one relatively small project in a city crippled by traffic but it could be a sign of things to come as the former mayor responsible for the project, Lee Myung Bak, is now the front runner in the race for the South Korean Presidency:

The demolition of a vast motorway through the centre of South Korea’s capital and the restoration of a river and park in its place proves that mega-cities can be changed for the better. One year ago this month, several million people headed to a park in the centre of Seoul, the capital of South Korea and seventh-largest city in the world. They didn’t go for a rock festival, a football match or a political gathering, but mostly to just marvel at the surroundings, to get some fresh air and to paddle in the river.

Thanks to Chris for sending this through.

When David Parker spoke this week at the Climate Change conference in Nairobi this week he had this to say about reducing Greenhouse Gas emissions from the transport sector:

In transport, we are like most countries. We have a real challenge on our hands. To reduce transport emissions will require a combination of improving the fuel efficiency of our vehicle fleet, better public transport and new, lower-emissions transport fuels. On the latter point, growing biofuels will be an important part of the development of alternative transport fuels.

The problem with Mr Parker’s statement is that it implies fuel efficiency, public transport and biofuels can all play a major role in reducing our emissions. The reality is that neither vehicle efficiency or biofuels will make much of an impact on C02 emissions from transport in the near future or perhaps at all (due to cost and availability of resources such as land for fuels). So while the Stern report has highlighted the need for significant cuts within 10 years our vehicle fleet won’t ‘turn over’ a big enough percentage in anything close to that time frame.

The primary reason that significantly improved vehicle efficiency and biofuels are wishful thinking in terms of near term progress on CO2 emissions reductions is that New Zealanders like to hang onto their (old) cars, at least according to the IMVDA:

More than 250,000 vehicles in our fleet are over 20 years old and more than 750,000 are over 15 years old. Last year, over 150,000 used vehicles and 85,000 new vehicles were imported; over 160,000 old vehicles were taken off the road and scrapped. This scrappage rate needs to be increased to achieve the Government’s aims.

That means we are limited in terms of the rate of introduction of new vehicle technologies into the fleet including the % of biofuels that we can safely use in our vehicles.

Then there is the issue of the Government’s own very modest targets for biofuels driven in part by concerns about the ability of our fleet to handle biofuels. Even if you believe that it is feasible to grow oil instead of food (or wood for construction) the Government is only planning to:

require oil companies to sell a minimum percentage of biofuels in transport fuels, beginning with 0.25% of sales in 2008, and rising to 2.25% by 2012, Judith Tizard said.

That is hardly much in the way of CO2 reductions (especially since biofuels are not considered 100% carbon neutral) and nothing close to what scientists such as those at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change in the UK now believe are necessary (90% reductions by 2050).

The bottom line is that it is going to be very hard for New Zealand to reduce emissions in the near term from farming. We can do better in electricity but 70% is already renewable. So that leaves Transport as the primary area where New Zealand needs to look to make quick and significant cuts in emissions. The only near term solution (and it still takes time with construction and purchasing lead times for new vehicles & trains) is a massive investment in Public Transport coupled with pricing signals (such as congestion charging, removal of free parking on weekends etc.) to get people to make the switch. And it is about much more than just the ride-to-work share, this is about making Public Transport a viable option on the weekends too.

That can only happen if the New Zealand Government ensures that Local Government begin to make Climate Change impact a primary concern in transport planning. That is clearly not the case today as the draft Regional Land Transport Strategy shows.

The first issue of “MetLink News” came out this week and it lists the very welcome (but inadequate) improvements to the Metlink public transport system over the next few years. You can find it online here:

http://www.metlink.org.nz/story20035.php

The highlights include the following improvements:

• Refurbishment of 19 English Electric train carriages this year in addition to the 14 carriages that have already been upgraded.
• Introduction of 18 new carriages on the Wairarapa Line from mid 2007.
• Purchase of 58 new electric carriages (Electric Multiple Units or EMUs) for the Hutt Valley, Johnsonville, Melling and Paraparaumu Lines, to be in service from 2010.
• Upgrade of the Ganz-Mavag trains now running on the Paraparaumu and Hutt Lines in 2009 to supplement the new EMUs.
• Improvements to train stations including raising and extending the Wairarapa Line station platforms and renewing signage.
• Improvements to the Johnsonville Line (depending on the outcome of the current Northern Suburbs Passenger Transport Study).
• Enhanced park and ride facilities at some stations.
• Installation of more double-tracking on the Paraparaumu Line.

However what is missing is the required investment significantly improve the quality of service on both the Paraparaumu & Hutt lines, specifically there is no funding for:

• Double tracking from Pukerua Bay to McKay’s Crossing,
• Fixing the ‘traffic jam’ at the Kaiwharawhara throat (just north of the train station)
• Double tracking between Trentham and Upper Hut
• Solving the Melling-Petone merge bottleneck

And that isn’t even the complete list of improvements that rail advocates have been asking for in order to get our Public Transport system closer to its full potential.

So what’s going on? Well, it seems that these critical investments are missing from the draft Regional Land Transport Strategy because the Regional Council is working to a business-as-usual model advocated by the car / road lobby that ignores the need to address Climate Change starting immediately. That has resulted in almost 90% of the new infrastructure funding going to road projects and not Public Transport (or cycling & walking for that matter).

It also appears that there is a coordinated effort to spin the the RLTS into a ‘good news for Public Transport’ story by lumping together ALL Public Transport funding including the operating and capital investment and then comparing that to the roading investment, most of which is for new roads. That’s hardly comparing apples with apples.

Here’s something that shows just how dependant on climate damaging road transport we are in New Zealand. It’s a graph from the Transport chapter of the 2005 OECD Indicators Report (trying to find out where this is available online, let me know if you find it) which shows that as of 2002 New Zealand had the highest number of kilometers travelled per unit of GDP.

That makes us the most inefficient in the OECD in terms of number of kilometers we travel (including use of trucks for moving goods) per unit of economic output. You have to hand it to the road lobby; they certainly have been very successful in their goal of making New Zealand a world leader in creating traffic.

Here’s an interesting article from the team at WorldChanging looking at the excellent progress that Transit for Livable Communities have been able to make towards sustainable transport for Minneapolis, Minnesota.

TLC has an initiative which they launched this year called Transportation Choices 2020 (TC2020) which aims, by the year 2020, to double bus services, create better transit facilities and new Park & Ride capacity, construct eight dedicated bus and rail transitways, and provide revenue to local governments for transit, bicycle & pedestrian projects. The goal emerges from the success of the Hiawatha Light Rail, which opened last June with partial service and continues to expand its range. Light rail has proven in many cities to be one of the most effective ways to get the public using transit, as well as a powerful factor in improving communities and development projects.

Thanks to Karl for sending this one in.

On Monday the DomPost reported that the Regional Land Transport Strategy (RLTS) is about to go out to households in the Wellington Region describing how to spend $4 billion on Roads and Public Transport.

Of the $4 billion to be spent, $2.7 billion is for roading projects while the remaining $1.3 billion is for Public Transport. That sounds pretty good until you take another look and see that while the $2.7 billion is for new roads (i.e. maintenance is funded separately) the $1.3 billion for Public Transport is for everything including long over due maintenance (e.g. train replacement) and operating subsidies. So when you compare apples with apples and look at investment in new capacity a whooping 94% of the investment goes to roads while 6% for everything else (i.e. Public Transport, walking and cycling).

[correction as of 17/11/2006: of the $2.7B, $1.7B is for new roads, $200M is for maintenance & $800M for local roads, much of which is likely to be new capacity although that is not clear. That makes it almost 90% of new infrastructure investment that is for roading rather than 94%. The bottom line is that the vast majority of the proposed investment in the RLTS is going to roads and not sustainable transport].

It seems that the proposed package will fail to meet even the modest targets for quality of service improvement outlined in the draft passenger transport plan and will increase our region’s contribution to Climate Change. Rather than being anything close to sustainable transport the RLTS as it is currently will continue the business-as-usual approach of roads at any cost that has dominated transport planning in the region for many years.

Copies of the document are due to go out in mid-November with consultation ending in mid-February. Option 3 and many other groups will be working hard to advocate for a much more realistic share of funding for new Public Transport, Cycling and Walking projects.

We could really do with your support.

Great session at the Paramount yesterday for the inaugural Climate Change Festival. Thanks to all those people who stopped by the Option 3 table and all of you who signed up to support Sustainable Transport. Congratulations to Antonia who won the copy of George Monbiot’s book “Heat: How to Stop the Planet Burning”, it is as they say, in the mail.
Roland did an great job of putting forward the case for Sustainable Transport during the ’stakeholders’ session when he spoke on behalf of Option3 and here’s a copy of his slides for those of you who couldn’t make it.

Good speakers with only a couple of notable exceptions. In fact, the only person who showed up to the event not really interested in talking about serious solutions to Climate Change was Mike Noon from the AA. Disappointing but hardly a surprise, it seems that Delay is the new Denial.
Labour, National and the Greens sent representatives and in my opinion Nick Smith from National and Russel Norman from the Greens both had the better of Marion Hobbs who was filling in for David Parker. The Maori Party, NZ First or United Future didn’t think it important enough to send anyone.

Of course the key question is now what the parties can do in terms of putting our money where their mouths are. Transport emissions can be reduced and quickly by shifting our focus away from “Cars at any cost” to Sustainable Transport.

But first the government must address the inequality of funding which sees only 15% of the Land Transport budget go to Public Transport. If we are serious about addressing New Zealand’s significant per person contributions to Climate Change then this amount should be more like 50% (or greater) and the current situation where a motorway is fully funded by government while alternatives such as rail only get matching funds must be addressed!
Option 3 will be putting that to the Minister for Climate Change, David Parker when we meet with him on Tuesday, that’s assuming he doesn’t send Marion Hobbs in his place.