Part-time Stuff journalist and owner of Club Burlesque on Auckland’s K Road, Verity Johnson is appalled. She says neither National nor Labour politicians understand the appeal of public transport in Auckland. Verity says we (Aucklanders) are obsessed with getting around. It’s all we talk about. Therefore Verity thinks last week’s transport announcements missed their mark. But did they?
Before going further it would be churlish not to congratulate Verity on some very creative writing. As an example, Verity says in the last five years in Auckland a strange bonding-through-transportation-trauma has taken place. It’s brought the True Blue Business Man and the Mung Bean Hipster together in a way that previously only Tom Cruise could. I know, she says, because I’m part of this daily crossing of the divides. Every day I, representing Team Alternative Milks, take a bus with True-Blue-Through-and-Through-Stew. Got that.
And, she adds, we chat the whole time about how much better this is than driving. It’s not that we’ve suddenly found a shared love of the climate. It’s just neither of us can do three hours of daily gridlock. And so frustration has given birth to a new, purely practical Auckland voter, who wants public transport because they can’t spend another minute in a car. Personally, I think Verity is a bit at odds with herself here. If the strange bonding through transportation trauma she talks about has in fact taken place surely the three-hour gridlock no longer exists.
With regard to the policies of National and Labour, I don’t think either missed the mark. Verity thinks they have because both have an emphasis on roads and bridges. Figures from last September supplied by figure.nz show there were just under 1.2 million cars on Auckland roads along with just over 200,000 goods vans, utes and trucks. Motorcycles numbered 41,000. This tells me that not everyone is getting Verity’s experience of the wheels on the bus going round.
The aforementioned figures give credence to both major parties’ policies. One, however, is more credible than the other. National has always maintained the importance of roads to New Zealand being recognised as a first-world country. Labour puts walking, cycling and public transport ahead of roads. Except when an election is just around the corner. HDPA on her programme pointed this out on Monday: Labour promised five major roading projects prior to the last election and post-election cancelled four of them.
Just under two months from this election, ‘Chippie Come Lately’ has once again found his liking for asphalt and not just for filling potholes. No siree! It’s tunnels, three no less, under the Waitemata Harbour. If Hipkins can’t win an election above water it looks to all intents and purposes that he’s going to try and win it below water. There’ll be two tunnels for cars, and one (pardon the mirth) for light rail. The current bridge will carry cars, buses and, of course, cyclists and pedestrians.
Jules Verne was famous for 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. I presume Hipkins, in terms of cyclists and walkers, wants to be famous for ‘20,000 Legs Over The Sea’. It won’t happen except maybe on a fine day at the weekend. The other reason Labour’s plan is not credible is they’re incapable of executing it. Where’s the tram to the airport promised by 2021? Only the other day, having spent $100 million on the project, we were told more work is needed before a sod of earth is turned.
If Labour’s announcement, in practice, follows along the lines of the airport tram our grandchildren will be lucky to benefit. Meanwhile National, in broad agreement, says it will get the project done quicker and more cheaply. They are also in favour of more busways, which should be music to Verity’s ears even though she omitted to make this point in her article. So all is not lost. The wheels on the bus will be going round for years to come even if there are only three people on board.
Labour will most likely still be in Opposition, stalled – just like their policies.
