owen

I saw this on youtube.com and while I know it is made by a anti-road campaigner, I can't disagree with the arguements. Time for the numpties in city hall and welly to wake up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCKDBHT3i74
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QYNpS7SI7k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO3d13EOfRI
its in 3 parts.

happynz

Hi Owen,

Could you summarise what the youtube videos are about. Some of us are on the Golden Age of Steam dial-up service and downloading video files is not really practical.

Thanks.

cypherpunk

The BS detector was working overtime on this one, for example they make the ludicrous claim that Auckland has a higher population density than New York. Auckland has a highly-developed motorway network that in terms of door-to-door travel times and value for money works as well as most other cities, and that is heresy in some quarters, no surprises there.

owen

points made through the 25mins are briefly as follows

auckers make 19 trips per capita on public transport per year compared to206 in montreal, a similar size city. in auck 1955 the number was 290 with the elec trams.

Funds for public trans forcast to decline to 2015, roads funds steeply climb.

the comparison with nyc is population per sq km of city. they were tryin to answer the question of auck is too spread out for public transport. auck 2000pop/sq km, nyc 2050, sydney 2100. i guess the prev poster point was auck pop more spread out evenly where nyc has big density in one area then less in the suburbs, making this stat irrelevant.

they were saying perth is more spread out with pop of 1.3million but a ratio of 1200 pop/per sqkm but has lots more rail network joining it together.

The benefit of rail is 10 times peak capacity over the same length of road.

that housing benefit a rail connection, like prices near a tube station. but house prices drop when a motorway is built nearby.

What i found the most interesting was the arguement of money. auck spent 16% of its wealth on transportation, 4 times that of copenhagen. thats because 36% bike to work, 23 % car, 33% public trans (auck 1%, >80%, 7%). It isn't helped that everything that has to do with roads(cars, parts, machinery, fuel) has to be imported into NZ which means lots of dollar leave the nz economy. An improved rail network once in place returns money back into nz economy(repairs, maintenance, electricity).

With fuel going rise in cost till it becomes a comodity of the rich before it runs out, it kinda makes sense. Doesn't seem another option really.

lardyl

Only been here for a few months but what strikes me about this part of N Island where the population centres are is that it is pretty undulating, hence trains are not going to work so well unless you spend lots of money on viaducts, embankments and cuttings. I'm all for decent public transport but Auckland seems to be beyond redemption, unless masses of money is spent or they go for some form of trolley bus system.
How does AKL compare with SFO? That is pretty up and down too!
As I've said elsewhere on the forum Kiwis love their cars, boats, etc but not trains. Maybe we need to move lots of businesses over onto the Shore in order to reduce the north/south commute and overcome that bottleneck.
Given the proposed levels of development north of the Shore I'd be its all gonna come to a grinding halt very soon - oh bugger I'll have o get up at 430 not 530!!

cypherpunk

No, the density figure for Auckland is just rubbish. At a guess what they have done is taken the population of the Auckland region and divided it by the area of Auckland City. The population density of Auckland City is only 635 people per square km (405k/637km2). In the Central Auckland zone it will be a bit higher but I hope no-one is suggesting running trains around that.

Or maybe it's because Copenhagen is a square city of 528 square kilometres and Auckland is a linear conurbation of 1086 square kilometres. I expect the economics are just as fudged as the density figures too.

lardyl

mmm...makes sense....but its difficult to deny that transportation costs per head are higher when car use is as high as it is here - also many journeys seem to require the use of the motorway network, which is so vulnerable to gridlock. And that is only going to get worse, much worse by all accounts.
Their main point has to be to do with sustainability and TBH I cant see the current situation as being sustainable, never mind what even the short term future will bring given the likely increase in the population of Greater Auckland and the developments of Albany, Silverdale, Warkworth, etc etc