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By admin, on October 22nd, 2009 I have posted a number of times in the past about why I think that widening roads is often a pretty pointless exercise – due to induced demand. This is the process by which expanding the supply of road capacity encourages more people to drive at peak times, thereby actually encouraging more use of the road and negating much of the supposed benefit that widening the road should have created. So what can be done to reduce congestion and actually squeeze more out of our transport system?
The obvious answer is a greater focus on public transport, but as I spend most of this blog banging home that message I will take this opportunity to look at ways we could squeeze more out of our roading system. On arterial roads there are plenty of opportunities to expand bus lanes, transit (carpool & bus) lanes and so forth, but often it is considered that motorways are simply the realm of people driving their own cars with no passengers, oh and trucks of course. However, it doesn’t have to be this way – and many overseas cities have looked at ways of shifting more people rather than just more cars along their motorways. Another idea has been to create toll lanes on motorways that would have people paying a variable toll on certain lanes of the motorway to effectively make it possible to pay one’s way out of congestion.
There seems to be two main approaches to “squeezing more out of motorways” that can be seen across the world – most particularly in the USA. These are high-occupancy vehicle lanes, and toll lanes. The image below actually shows both of these measures operating side by side, in Denver:
Starting with high-occupancy vehicle lanes (HOV lanes, often known in New Zealand as T2 or T3 lanes), these are lanes that you are only allowed to drive along if you have two, three or more people in the car (depending on the type of HOV lane). There are already a few HOV lanes in Auckland, with Onewa Road (T3) being probably the best known. This lane has proven to be quite effective in offering people who use Onewa Road on Auckland’s North Shore with a quicker option to the highly congested main lane if they are carpooling. The carpool lane is shared with a great number of buses, which helps contribute to Onewa Road being one of the busier bus routes in all of Auckland. There are a number of other T3 lanes around North Shore City, while quite a few motorway onramps with ramp signals have T2 lanes that bypass the signals.
Toll lanes obviously work a bit differently, in that you effectively pay to drive in a particular lane of the motorway – with the toll often varying according to the level of use in that lane so that it does not become congested. There are no toll lanes within New Zealand at the moment, but quite a few operate within the USA – with perhaps the “91 Express Lanes” in Los Angeles being the most well known. These lanes (two in each direction) operate down the middle of the Riverside Freeway in Orange County, California and are controlled by a varying toll of up to $1 per mile – or around $9.90 for the entire length of the lanes during the time of highest demand (4pm-5pm in the eastbound direction). The lanes have operated since 1995, and seem to have been reasonable successful – at least to the extent that we’re now seeing many other US cities establish these lanes, particularly around the San Francisco Bay Area.
I’m a big fan of expanding HOV lanes, particularly if they are established by turning current general traffic lanes into HOV lanes (and not turning bus lanes into HOV lanes as Auckland City Council have proposed for Tamaki Drive). Carpooling can be a very simple and effective way of increasing vehicle occupancy rates and therefore reducing the number of cars that are required to shift people along a transport corridor. Carpooling is also apparently very efficient and potentially environmentally friendly – as you don’t end up with empty runs as can happen with buses and trains during lower demand periods.
So one way that I think Auckland could improve the efficiency of its motorway system could be by turning one of the lanes on each of the main motorways into an HOV lane during peak hour in the peak direction. This would only really be feasible on stretches of the motorway with at least three lanes in the direction being travelled (so you would be left with at least two general lanes plus the HOV lane) – but that would actually encompass most of Auckland’s more congested sections of motorway (another sign of induced demand that our widest bits of motorway are the most congested?) The map below shows the stretches of SH1 and SH16 that currently have more than two lanes in each direction, and therefore are candidates in my opinion for the outside/fast lane being turned into an HOV lane: The lengths of motorway coloured green are those parts wide enough for one of the lanes to be turned into an HOV lane. Now I realise that this would be a pretty dramatic step for NZTA to take – but really when you consider that it is going to cost over $800 million to simply add one lane each way to the Northwest Motorway between St Lukes and Westgate, perhaps it is time we looked at getting more out of our existing motorway lanes?
In terms of toll lanes, I will take a bit more convincing when it comes to the merits of these. The Wikipedia page for toll lanes (sometimes called HOT, high-occupancy-toll, lanes) identifies some criticisms that I think are pretty valid:
Because HOT lanes and ETLs are often constructed within the existing road space, they are criticized as being an environmental tax or perk for the rich (“Lexus lanes”). Those who criticize the concepts claim that the lanes provide congestion relief to the motorists of a higher socioeconomic class. With HOT and hybrid lanes, the attempt to address this criticism typically consists of special treatment for HOVs. Personal vehicles carrying more than a specified amount of passengers (typically two or three) are permitted to use the HOV lanes at a reduced toll (hybrid lanes) or for free (HOT lanes). Additionally, public transit vehicles are typically exempted from the toll. A counter-argument is that the rich often already have ways to ease their commute that are not available to the poor, such as buying a home closer to where they work.
Nevertheless, toll lanes are really taking off overseas and if social equity issues can be overcome, they could be an effective way to reduce congestion for time-sensitive transport requirements at a relatively low cost.
I think another issue is the practicality and efficiency of developing toll lanes (although this also applies to HOV lanes). Are the advantages worth the cost of the physical works to actually build these lanes? Do the lanes have their own dedicated ramps? How do you manage things to ensure people only drive in the HOV lanes when they have two, three or more people in the car and so forth? These are some interesting questions to answer, but with the cost of building additional general lanes becoming higher and higher, I think that we will have to look at these options sooner rather than later.
By admin, on October 22nd, 2009 An ARTA press release advises that over the upcoming Labour weekend there will be no trains on the Southern or Western Lines, so that some big upgrades to the rail network can be undertaken. There is some good detail in the media release about what works will actually be undertaken:
Buses replace trains as work to upgrade Auckland’s rail network continues this Labour Weekend
As Aucklanders enjoy the first long weekend of the spring season, extensive work to upgrade the rail network will continue around the region. In order to allow works by the Auckland Regional Transport Authority (ARTA) and KiwiRail to take place, buses will replace trains on the Southern and Western Lines from Saturday 24 October until Monday 26 October.
Buses will operate in place of trains on the Southern Line between Britomart and Otahuhu (via Newmarket South) throughout the duration of the weekend. On the Western Line, buses will replace trains between Britomart and Waitakere on Saturday 24 and Monday 26 October and between Britomart and New Lynn on Sunday 25 October.
ARTA’s General Manager Customer Services, Mark Lambert says “There’s lots of action this Labour weekend to continue the enhancement of Auckland’s rail network to deliver improved services and facilities for passengers in the future.
“ARTA is starting initial work on the upgrade to Kingsland rail station, a key station for the Rugby World Cup, and KiwiRail will be working on the Sandringham Road overbridge in preparation for electrification.”
“Further electrification works will take place on Mt Eden Road, and at Avondale work on the new station will be progressed.
“In Newmarket new beams essential to the reconstruction of the Remuera Road overbridge will be installed and track work on Khyber Pass Road will continue.”
Customers should look for RAIL BUS signs at affected stations for directions to rail bus stops. Normal train fares apply for the entire journey.
“This is an important period of development for Auckland’s rail network and we thank passengers for their patience whilst these key advances are being made” Mr Lambert said.
In particular it is good seeing some further works that relate to electrification. Which reminds me, I wonder when we will be hearing more about how many trains Auckland will be getting?
By admin, on October 21st, 2009 It’s quite arguable that Auckland hasn’t had a good transport strategy in over 60 years – ever since the 1946 plan to invest in both expansions of the rail network and the road network was shelved in favour of around 50 years where public transport investment was almost non-existent and Auckland went down a rather nasty path towards becoming one of the most auto-dependent cities in the entire world. While we’ve come a long way in the last decade, there are many signs that the progress that has been made is fragile, and that we’re really only a couple of steps away from heading back to the roads-centric thinking that dominated transport planning in Auckland throughout most of the latter half of the 20th century.
So it is encouraging to see that the Regional Transport Committee today considered the release for consultation of a transport strategy – the 2010-2040 Regional Land Transport Strategy – that looks to build on the improvements that have been made to public transport over the past decade and take things one step further. It looks to truly revolutionise Auckland’s transport system away from auto-dependency and towards public transport led change. For those truly interested in every last detail of this, the RTC’s meetings agenda is available here while the full draft RLTS is available here.
A few weeks ago I commented that the RTC had made some critical last minute changes to the draft RLTS – namely having it say that the CBD Rail Tunnel should be completed by 2021, that route protection of the airport railway line should begin immediately and that a chapter relating to how transport is likely to be affected by energy issues like peak oil, and the need to reduce CO2 emissions, should also be included. So let’s have a brief look at bits of the draft strategy, starting with a bit of the introduction: I think it’s excellent that a strong link has been made between transport and urban form. Over the past 20 years Auckland has done a lot of work to come up with the most suitable growth strategies for the region up until 2050, and it’s critical that our transport investment works with – and not against – these strategies. In my opinion there has been something of a mismatch between our urban growth strategies and our transport strategies up until now (we still build motorways to encourage sprawl while at the same time putting an urban growth limit on the city to limit its sprawl), so it’s good to see an awareness of the strong link between these two matters – and the resulting desire to ensure that the transport system assists in achieving our development plans.
Numerous different options were looked at in the formation of the RLTS as to what the overall thrust of the strategy should be. I am glad to say that it seems like we’re going with the most public transport friendly option and that (unlike the 2005 strategy which was a choice of lots of roads or lots and lots of roads) this option is actually very public transport oriented. Let’s have a look at that preferred option in a bit more detail: In terms of what this actually means, a breakdown of the likely projects within this preferred strategic option to be constructed between 2010 and 2040 includes: Now of course what really matters here are not fancy words, but a look at what money is available and where it will be directed. Auckland has a nasty habit of producing plans and strategies that sound all positive for public transport, yet when you dig a bit deeper allocate a huge majority of funding to roading projects. Furthermore, it is central government and not local government that holds most of the purse-strings when it comes to transport – although in the scheme of things the Regional Land Transport Strategy is a pretty powerful document. So it’s interesting to see what the RLTS has to say about funding issues: I’m glad that there is a growing realisation that a single pool of funds is required to fix Auckland’s transport issues, rather than different funding methods being used for different types of projects. Unless such a change to transport funding is made, I do fear that none of these large public transport projects will ever get off the ground – even though they are desperately needed.
I think we’ve just put together our best transport strategy in 60 years, although it remains to be seen whether Auckland will get the support it needs to implement the strategy. Let’s hope so.
By admin, on October 20th, 2009 An article in the NZ Herald today explores the possibility of looking at possibly up to four stations being constructed on the CBD Rail Tunnel – rather than the current proposal for two (well, really three if you count the relocated Mt Eden station). This idea has been floated by Mike Lee, the Chairman of the ARC and most probably Auckland’s biggest public transport advocate – so it’s something worth looking into a bit more. Here’s the relevant extract from the article:
Auckland Regional Council chairman Mike Lee has asked officials to consider adding more underground stations to a proposed $1 billion to $1.5 billion rail tunnel below the central business district.
He wants a $5 million study commissioned by KiwiRail and his council’s transport authority subsidiary to consider doubling to four the number of stations proposed for a 3.4km route between Britomart and Mt Eden via Albert St.
Until now, only two stations in the vicinities of Aotea Square and Karangahape Rd have been suggested for the study’s purposes of recommending a preferred route.
But Mr Lee has baulked at a suggestion by council member Joel Cayford, a former regional transport committee chairman, that the study also consider future underground connections in other directions from the tunnel.
“Let’s not get too complicated – this is about the CBD tunnel and we have to justify it to the Minister [of Transport, Steven Joyce] and as soon as possible,” Mr Lee told Dr Cayford and other councillors…
…Mr Lee, despite his cautionary advice to Dr Cayford, nominated Wyndham and Victoria Sts as possible sites for two extra stations to cater for a growing inner-city population of apartment dwellers.
Now let’s get a couple of things out of the way to start with. Firstly, it’s fantastic that this project is continuing to get more and more publicity. There now really seems to be some real momentum behind the CBD Rail Tunnel, and I am very much looking forward to the outcome of this research study into the tunnel. Secondly, I agree with Mike Lee that this is not the time to be looking at alternative alignments. The one chosen for further research is very similar to alignments that have been looked at over the past 80 years and it is one that makes a lot of sense. If there ends up being nasty unforeseen problems with this option, then I think we should look at alternatives – but for now I am really of the opinion that as much effort as possible needs to be put towards promoting this project.
So if we turn to the number of stations, as you can see on the hastily drawn map of the route I have done below, there will definitely be two new stations – Midtown and K Road – while the current Mt Eden station may well be shifted to the southern end of the rail tunnel so that it can provide better access to Eden Terrace.
While I agree with Mike Lee on most transport related matters, I must say that on this occasion I don’t actually think there is much point in building more than two stations. I have three main reasons for this opinion:
- Underground stations are really really expensive. Two more stations could potentially add up to $200-300 million to the cost of this project – pushing it out from $1.5 billion approximately to around $1.8 billion. I’d hate to see that being the difference between the project going ahead and not going ahead.
- The grades of the tunnel are already going to be pushing what is possible. The tracks aside platforms need to be pretty flat, which means that with four sections of flat track rather than two sections, the remaining area is going to need to be steeper to compensate. This might make the project technically unviable.
- The benefits of additional stations are relatively minor.
Working through these three points, I must admit the first one is largely guesswork. However, I do know that underground train stations are enormously expensive and difficult to build. Throughout the lower part of the CBD the train line will be travelling underneath Albert Street, which means digging down to build a large area for an underground station is going to be a challenging and very expensive job. This project is already expensive enough, and will most likely already struggle to get enough funding – so I see little point in raising the cost of it even further unless the benefits gained are particularly massive.
In terms of the grade of the tunnel, if we take the figure of the article above, the tunnel will be approximately 3.4 km long. The tracks at Britomart are a few metres below sea level at the moment, while the current Western Line at Mt Eden station is approximately 72 metres above sea level. Generally it is considered that a railway track should have a grade of no steeper than “1 in 50″ (one metre up or down for every 50 metres across) for extended lengths, although there are some places where this is exceeded. Getting trains up around 75 metres at a 1 in 50 grade would take around 3.75 kilometres of track – which we don’t actually have here. Further complicating matters is that at stations you cannot really have a sloping track as it can be difficult for trains to get started and go uphill immediately – so we can effectively remove a couple of hundred metres from the total distance for each station that is included. Doubling the number of stations on the line would double the length of track that couldn’t be rising, which therefore increases the steepness of the track elsewhere in the tunnel. If we had four stations, each with say 200m of flat track set aside for station platforms and “vertical curves” (where a flat bit of track slowly becomes a rising or falling bit of track) that would effectively remove 800m of length from the tunnel, which is already arguably a bit too short for the climb it has to do. This might be the final killer blow for this idea, as it could make the whole project practically impossible.
The third point, is questioning whether we really need any more stations than the two currently proposed. More stations will slow down the trip, they will be expensive to build and so forth. All in all, for there to be more stations they need to be highly justified. To get some idea of how well the current station locations “cover” the CBD, I have used the trusty Google Earth to measure the distances between the stations on the northern side of where the railway line would go underneath the Southern Motorway. These are as follows:
- Karangahape Road station to Midtown Station: ~970m
- Midtown Station to Britomart Station: ~770m
Generally it is considered that 400m takes about 5 minutes to walk. So this means that even if you’re bang in the middle between Midtown Station and Karangahape Road station (which would be around the bottom end of Vincent street) you would still have not much more than a 5 minute walk to either of those two stations. If you were bang in the middle of Midtown and Britomart stations (around the intersection of Wyndham Street and Albert Street) you would have barely a 350m walk to either station – taking less than five minutes. So I really can’t see either of those situations being poor enough to justify the huge extra cost in having additional underground stations.
Overall, I don’t really think it’s worth pursuing adding any additional stations to this proposed project. I think it would work just fine with the suggested two main stations.
By admin, on October 19th, 2009 There was an interesting article in the Sunday Star Times yesterday, calling for the next crossing of the Waitemata Harbour to be a bridge rather than a tunnel. As I outlined a few months ago, the current plan for the next crossing of the Waitemata – whenever it should be required – is a pile of tunnels, potentially two for rail and two for road. The total cost of this project is pretty immense, $3.7-$4.1 billion for the whole thing. Personally, I don’t think it is something that will be required for quite a number of years yet – largely because from a public transport perspective the Northern Busway has plenty of capacity remaining before it becomes overloaded; while from a roading perspective there are more significant capacity constraints to the north and south of the bridge – rather than the bridge itself.
Nevertheless, I suppose that at some point in the future we will need to build another crossing of the harbour. The current ‘clip-ons’ on the side of the Harbour Bridge have a limited lifespan and will probably reach that limit some time within the next 30-40 years. While they could be replaced one at a time, cutting the Harbour Bridge back to 6 lanes without building an alternative route would lead to a lot of chaos and probably couldn’t really happen for an extended period of time. More detail on NZTA’s current preferred option is available here, while the bridge option is detailed a bit more below:
 Costings and technical details for a new Auckland harbour bridge will be released on 3 December as part of a wide-ranging feasibility analysis, the ANZAC Centenary Bridge Group announced today.
The Group consists of a number of well known local companies, including NZ Steel, Mainzeal, Aspec Properties, Davis Langdon, and Jasmax.
It has been endorsed by organisations such as the Returned Services’ Association, the Heavy Engineering Research Association and Heart of the City, and has received guidance on financial and technical matters from leading international consulting firms.
Representatives of the Group have had encouraging informal discussions on the ANZAC Centenary Bridge with Prime Minister John Key, Transport Minister Steven Joyce, Auckland MPs, and other Government officials.
The Group is committed to promoting a solution to the Waitemata Harbour crossing debate that addresses Auckland’s transport needs, celebrates the city’s natural and cultural heritage, and elevates its standing on the world stage.
A new bridge can deliver such a solution, the Group maintains, and can do so more cost-effectively than a tunnel or any other alternative. The Group is calling for the new bridge to be constructed by 2015, to commemorate the ANZAC Day centenary.
Group spokesman Richard Simpson said it was confident that the Government would give equal consideration to a bridge as to a tunnel when it came time to decide on options for a new harbour crossing this December.
“The new ANZAC Centenary Bridge would be cheaper to build and operate than the new tunnel/existing bridge option”, he explained. “It would carry more cars and trucks, while providing for rail, cyclists and pedestrians. We see it as the best option in economic, environmental, and social terms.”
Mr Simpson said that the Group was currently focused on getting the numbers right, rather than “making noise”.
“We look forward to sharing the full details of the feasibility report in early December”, he said. “Until then, the key thing is following the correct process to ensure that the bridge option gets on the table.”
Nevertheless, Mr Simpson said more information would soon be available on the proposed new bridge, with the ANZAC Centenary Bridge Group website scheduled to go live at http://www.bridge2015.org.nz by the end of October.
Mr Simpson described the interest and support that the Group had received thus far as “very positive”, and as having come from both large and small companies and organisations, from a range of areas of the economy.
Some of the estimated benefits of this option are outlined by this “ANZAC Centenary Bridge Group” include:
1) Construction cost $2-3 billion compared to $3.7–$4.1b for the proposed tunnel
2) Operating cost of 1/5 to 13 of a tunnel (based on ventilation, lighting, drainage and maintenance)
3) About 350,000m2 of land valued at around $1b in St Mary’s Bay and Northcote Pt could be sold off after closure of bridge.
4) Travel time and distance savings worth about $60 million a year (based on a bridge being 1.2km shorter than a tunnel)
5)Estimated tourism benefits: $325 million a year (based on tourists staying an extra night)
I think a likely route for the roading part (red) and the rail part (blue) of the project would be as I have shown in the map below:
So, now that we’ve looked at the potential benefits of this option, let’s examine it’s negative effects. Firstly, let’s be clear that as part of building a new bridge instead of going with the tunnel option we would have to remove the current harbour bridge. This would be pretty expensive in itself and would also remove a pretty massive Auckland icon – whether or not we consider it to be a particularly great design there can be no doubting that the Harbour Bridge symbolises Auckland in many ways and it would be a pretty big step to completely remove it. Secondly, there would be some potentially pretty nasty urban design effects on the Tank Farm area at the southern end of the bridge – arising mainly because it would have to be pretty high up to avoid conflicts with shipping, plus I imagine having a viaduct over Tank Farm would be considered preferable to having a surface level motorway running through this part of the city.
Another big issue to resolve would be how to actually make the rail link work. The tracks at Britomart are about 8m or similar below ground level, and they would need to rise up steadily to join the bridge at its southern abutment. That would mean a slowly rising railway line cutting through a very large part of Auckland’s CBD – once again being incredibly expensive and also having potentially significant visual effects on that part of the city (even if it was run down the middle of Fanshawe Street for example).
So all-in-all, I just can’t see this as being a viable option. By cutting an elevated motorway and railway line through the heart of the CBD it would take us back decades in terms of urban design, whereas a tunnel is a modern solution that removes or reduces the effects of the transport project on the surrounding urban fabric. So while it’s an interesting idea in principle – and it potentially quite cheap compared to the tunnel options – I really don’t think it would end up having a good effect on Auckland at all.
By admin, on October 18th, 2009 Back in July ARTA announced that Thales had won the contract to provide Auckland’s integrated ticketing system. This came after a rather nasty few months of uncertainty after the Regional Fuel Tax was cancelled in March. However, the announcement brought that uncertainty to a close (or so I thought), and it certainly made things sound like we weren’t going to end up with some sort of half-arse solution – even though the funding available for the project had been rather significantly reduced. Let’s recall what ARTA’s chairman, Rabin Rabindran, said about the system we’d be getting at the time:
“Boarding times will be faster for our customers because fares won’t have to be collected. The ticket will be a swipe on/ swipe off system. Faster boarding times will mean ARTA has the potential to put on more frequent services. Having a smartcard means ease of transfer for commuters between different bus operators, train and ferry services.
“An integrated ticketing system also has the potential to offer some very attractive fare reductions in comparison to cash purchase of tickets.
“The system will include automated gates, smartcard readers onboard buses and ferries, smartcard reload devices at selected rail and bus stations and ferry wharves, and the supply of all computer hardware, software, networks and communications”.
Mr Rabindran says the system will be similar to London’s Oyster system and Hong Kong’s Octopus system. Like Oyster, ARTA plans to initially implement core functions and progressively phase in additional functionality.
That all sounds pretty damn fantastic – exactly what Auckland needs. As far as I know, ARTA and NZTA together decided that the system offered by Thales, a French company with many years experience in creating integrated ticketing systems, was more worthy of the contract than the alternative that was put forward by Infratil – basically an extension of the Snapper Card system used on their bus services in Wellington. It was apparently a pretty intense battle between Thales and Infratil for the contract, but once Thales were awarded it Infratil (at the time) accepted that decision. This was after Infratil had challenged a previous decision by ARTA to award the contract to Thales on the grounds that it was biased and flawed. NZTA rejected that challenge – saying that it had absolutely no grounds.
So where does that leave things now? Well, for a start it really does seem as though Infratil was completely lying when they said they would accept that decision, and have subsequently been pushing the case (again) that Snapper should get the contract for integrated ticketing, rather than Thales. Secondly, the decision by ARTA and NZTA to choose Thales as the prefered supplier of Auckland’s integrated ticketing system is separate to NZTA’s decision to stump up the necessary funds to actually carry out this project. This second decision was meant to be made by NZTA some time within the last couple of weeks at their October meeting. My understanding is that the meeting took place, but no decision has yet been released.
This seems odd.
I have made my opinions on ARTA/NZTA’s decision to award the contract to Thales quite clear in the past. Ultimately, in my opinion the conflict of interest between Infratil running the ticketing system (through Snapper) and running a big chunk of the bus system (through NZ Bus) was just a recipe for disaster and I am glad that ARTA have instead chosen Thales for this critical project. This feeling has been strengthened over the last couple of weeks, largely due to the way that Infratil acted throughout the bus lockout. Imagine if some of their Snapper staff decided to “work to rule”, and in response they shut down the entire ticketing system, so that absolutely none of Auckland’s public transport was able to function? Talk about potential for an absolutely huge disaster!
I must say I am a little worried that NZTA is taking so long to release their decision. Did NZTA confirm the funding for Thales and Infratil is desperately trying to get them to reverse the decision, using their seemingly strong links with those in power? Or did NZTA backtrack on the numerous previous decisions, but are unwilling to release their decision with Infratil’s behaviour over the bus lockout fresh in everyone’s memory? I do wonder what’s going on with this, especially as we desperately need to get on with this project so that it can be completed by the time of the Rugby World Cup.
And if there’s one transport project we do desperately need for the Rugby World Cup, it’s integrated ticketing.
By admin, on October 16th, 2009 If I can keep getting my hands on them, I hope to regularly post up on here a copy of KiwiRail’s weekly newsletter – The Express. Generally there’s at least a few things in there of interest to me, and of relevance to the Auckland transport situation. This week’s newsletter includes :
- Information on the extra work done to ensure smooth running of the trains during the extra pressure placed on them over the last week by the bus strike.
- Information on the consenting of the Marsden Point rail spur designation.
- Quite a detailed piece on meetings between KiwiRail and the Rail and Maritime Transport Union
- Work done to “de-stress” tracks meaning that in summer when they heat up the trains won’t have to slow down as often.
By admin, on October 16th, 2009 There was a question on the Campaign for Better Transport Forums the other day that really got me thinking. Basically, it was “what is Auckland’s highest frequency bus route?” I have expanded that a little bit in terms of this post, to “what is Auckland’s best bus route?” as a bit of a discussion point.
Clearly there is a distinction between the best bus route and the highest frequency bus route, although the two are also quite inter-linked. The 680/681 route between Downtown and the Botany/Flat Bush/Howick area has reasonably good frequencies (at least at peak times), but I wouldn’t necessarily call it a particularly good route – as very little of it is bus laned, and it is very very slow (taking well over an hour to complete the whole journey even during off-peak times). Conversely, some of the express buses that serve the North Shore during the peak times offer a pretty damn good service as they are able to use the busway, but are very much limited in the times they operate. In my mind, the best bus route should offer high frequencies and a fast ride. Let’s explore where they are.
Looking first at frequencies, there are many different routes in Auckland that provide pretty good peak hour frequencies, but then it falls away during the off-peak times and at weekends. Perhaps the North Shore buses refered to above are the most extreme examples of this – where you have a tonne of peak hour express buses, but then all the off-peak buses travel much slower and longer routes, come at lower frequencies and are generally just far less useful. As you can see in the image below, the peak time frequencies of the express buses add up to a very good service if you’re travelling from the North Shore to the CBD at peak times: However, if you’re travelling in the counter-peak direction or if you’re travelling during off-peak hours, the bus services available to this part of the North Shore area generally a lot poorer. This is clearly shown in the timetable below: In my mind, a good measure of what a bus route’s “true frequency” is, is how often buses run during the weekday inter-peak hours. This is often (although not always) the same frequency as what is run on Saturdays – and to me seems like the “base” for comparing bus routes against one another to find out which one truly is the best.
With that in mind, I think the routes which set the standard in Auckland are the Dominion Road buses, the Mt Eden Road buses and the Northern Express. All three of these routes operate 10 minute frequencies during that weekday inter-peak period, while they all pile masses of buses onto the road during the peak time. Here’s an example of the Mt Eden Road service timetable during the inter-peak hours: Other roads that probably also have excellent levels of service provision are Great North Road, Great South Road and Manukau Road. However, particularly with Great North and Great South roads, this comes as the result of the bunching of a whole pile of routes that spread out further along the route. Furthermore, the buses that operate along these routes are done so by a wide variety of companies – so in actual fact it’s likely that the frequency of the bus you’re actually trying to catch is a lot lower than would seem to be the case. That is why I don’t consider those two roads in particular to necessarily have as good a service as the three I have mentioned so far. Other possible routes with high frequencies could be Onewa Road, New North Road, Sandringham Road, Remuera Road and Tamaki Drive services. Perhaps the Link Bus could be included too, as its frequencies are pretty good.
Of course, the second part of analysing how good a bus route/service is, is to look at how fast it is, how good its prioritisation is and how clear/legible it is. Of course, it is generally the best routes that end up with the highest frequencies – because they are so popular – so there are many links with the other half of my analysis. It is this part of analysing Auckland’s bus routes that make Dominion Road and Northern Express services stand out above the rest. In particular, it is the length of these routes where buses have been given priority. Dominion Road has the most extensive bus lanes in Auckland City, and we all know that the Northern Express runs along the pretty fancy Northern Busway. In contrast, Mt Eden Road has pretty poor bus lanes that for some inexplicable reason only operate between 4.30pm and 5.30pm in the evening (even though every other bus lane in Auckland is at least 4-6pm).
In terms of choosing between the Northern Express and Dominion Road buses, there are pros and cons for each one I suppose in determining the number one. In favour of the Northern Express is the fact that it’s basically rapid transit – running along the busway or along bus shoulder lanes for most of its journey. The stations that it serves are very modern and of international standard. The frequencies are excellent – a bus every 4-5 minutes at peak time and no worse than every 10 minutes at off-peak times. Another advantage is that it begins its run at Britomart – so has good integration with other bus routes and the train system . On the down-side, as yet there has not been much integration between the Northern Busway and the intensification of land development around the busway stations – so the Northern Express is not much use unless you catch a feeder bus, drive or are dropped off at one of the station. By contrast the Dominion Road buses directly service people who can walk to the bus stops, making the route useful for a greater number of people. On the down-side for Dominion Road is that not all the route has bus lanes, that it doesn’t have anything quite as flash as the Northern Busway to run along, that there are some nasty bottlenecks around Balmoral and Valley Road, and that the service doesn’t terminate at Britomart, but way up around the Civic Centre. However, Dominion Road does probably offer better peak hour frequencies and provides a whole range of different route options – with some being express services, some only running from Mt Roskill, some only running from Valley Road and so on. As shown in the diagram below, quite an extraordinary number of buses arrive in the CBD along Dominion Road during the morning peak – 36 within 60 minutes by my count: In the end, I think I’ll call it a tie between those two.
By admin, on October 15th, 2009 A couple of months ago I stated that if there were two things I could change about transport, it would be creating one pot of money for transport – and also to change the way that transport projects are analysed. This post focuses on the second of those two issues, and it based around a journal article that I came across today that makes for interesting reading.
Effectively, each transport project that gets funded goes through a process of analysing its costs and benefits – to basically ensure that it’s worth spending money on. Then once these costs and benefits have been monetarised and aggregated, they are compared to the cost of the project to see how it stacks up. A cost benefit ratio of less than 1 means that the project will provide less benefit than its cost, while a ratio of above 1 means that its benefits are greater than its cost – effectively that it’s a project that might be worth doing. Of course, that makes everything sound quite simple, but the reality is quite different. The main question is “how do we calculate the costs and benefits?” Not only do we need to find a way to measure what the benefits would be (and often they’re quite broad benefits like enabling economic growth and so forth), but we also need to find a way of working out how to effectively apply a dollar value to each benefit. Furthermore, we don’t actually know what will happen in 10 or 20 years time once a project is complete (or not complete), so a cost-benefit analysis involves a lot of estimation and potential guess-work. We also need to look at costs of the project other than its simply construction and maintenance costs – like effects on carbon emissions, air pollution and other matters.
The aforementioned article does provide France as a case study, but most of the article stays quite broad in terms of an overview of what a cost-benefit analysis is, analysing how they’re undertaken, and (importantly) some criticisms of the process. At their simplest, a cost-benefit analysis (CBA) a way of ensuring you don’t waste money on something that won’t provide a decent return on that investment. The article provides further detail on the steps of how a CBA is undertaken:
The first phase consists of identifying the advantages and the disadvantages so that the effects to be taken into account can be measured. For each measurable effect, a physical measurement scale must first be specified. Then, an appropriate procedure for measuring the quantity of the effect to be evaluated must be conceived and applied to each competing project.
The second phase begins by making a list of the available appropriate procedures for assigning a monetary value to each physical unit identified in the first phase. These procedures maybe based on surveys known as stated preference or contingent valuation, emphasizing willingness to pay or receive. Since observing human behavior can reveal certain preferences, the procedures may also be based on the behavior exhibited by existing markets, allowing indirect estimates of the impact resulting from the benefits accrued or problems caused.
In the third phase of the monetary evaluation procedure,the future changes of a certain number of reference values considered in CBA calculations should be determined precisely. Therefore, it is necessary to plan for the future, an activity which leads to forecasting the reference values, particularly those concerning air pollution, noise or the implicit value of a human life.
The CBA that I am most familiar with is that undertaken for the Wateview Connection project. The version of the CBA that I include below relates to the previous full tunnel option, rather than the current partial surface/tunnel option, but still provides a useful guide for what a CBA looks like – and gives some hints as to how it was calculated.
The way these actual numbers were calculated is enormously complicated, involving very detailed traffic models, things called “discount rates” (the benefit of a project supposedly decreases by a certain amount each year) and the kind of strange thinking that separates travel time savings from congestion relief benefits. The Journal Article delves far deeper into those issues – so have a read of that if you’re interested.
Now we have some idea about how CBAs work, let’s have a look at some of the problems with them. My suspicion of time-savings benefits have been explained more fully in the past, but that is mainly a criticism of how one particular aspect of a CBA is undertaken, rather than a criticism of the concept of doing a CBA in general. Firstly, let’s have a look at whether a CBA really is the “objective analysis” that it appears to be trying to achieve. Because there are so many variables that go into a CBA, there ends up being a lot of assumption being made: what is the value of a human life when calculating safety costs/benefits? What is the value of time saved? Does it depend on a person’s profession? What is the value of noise pollution? Furthermore, because of the ‘discount rates’ applied, benefits that will be enjoyed a long time into the future are given far less value than those experienced in the near future. Is this really applicable given our need to improve inter-generational sustainability?
Once we have such a large number of assumptions, there can be a huge amount of debate that enters this supposedly neutral analysis. In my opinion, it seems as though the process of coming up with this “magic number” – the final cost-benefit ratio – is such a “grey” issue that the debate it is likely to generate should be open to public input. Yet, at the moment it seems as though the process is undertaken as a deep dark secret – under the impression that it’s a completely non-biased neutral process. The public simply doesn’t get the opportunity to question “is this project worth it?” – but instead during the consenting process can only argue about whether its environmental effects are acceptable or unacceptable.
The disconnection between the deep dark secret way that CBAs are conducted, and the general acceptance of public input into important decision making processes is a pretty big flaw in the way the current system works in my opinion. This disconnection is explored in the aforementioned journal article, and is the main concluding point of the whole article:
The evolution of the transport infrastructure decision-making context now obliges public decision-makers to worry about two new elements in the decision-making process: rationalization of public resource use and stakeholder acceptance of the choices made. Evaluating the socio-economic significance of projects using cost–benefit analysis techniques takes care of the first element. For this reason,we have described the principles of cost–benefit analysis and tried to show how it is performed in France. The second element has pushed the French legislature to progressively institutionalize the practices and tools that permit public debate.To illustrate this change, we presented the objectives and operating principles of the Public Inquiry Procedure and the National Commission for Public Debate.
In this paper, we support the thesis that cost–benefit analysis,as it is carried out today in France, is not compatible with relevant and constructive debate. In fact, in order to deal with the two concerns mentioned above, it is necessary to create a closer link between the processes of evaluation and debate. As we have attempted to show, this link can be improved relatively simply.In general,what is really at issue is the relationship between the requirements of rationality that the actors would like to see in every decision-making process and the requirements of legitimacy that are accrued through the collaborative process of public debate. These two requirements are not incompatible. In our opinion, the two can be reconciled by revamping the socio-economic evaluation tools and changing the way that economic evaluation is carried out.
To bring this back to the Waterview Connection, and make a bit more sense out of it – the current situation (and it is the same in both France and New Zealand) is that the project’s costs and benefits can be debated, but only in terms of its environmental effects through the Resource Management Act. There is no ability for me to publicly question, for example, exactly how NZTA came up with its $2.7 billion of time-savings benefits, or how they are different to the $690 million of congestion relief benefits, or what traffic model was used to determine the time-savings benefits, or whether the analysis of CO2 emissions has been done accurately.
I think it is quite obvious that working out a cost-benefit ratio for a project is not just a technical task for some faceless bureaucrat to undertake, but rather it is a contestable and debatable process – where a variety of different voices should be heard, and the assumptions that have inevitably been made throughout the CBA are probed and critiqued. After all, when there are enormous amounts of public funds being used, creating – as the journal article calls it – a sense of legitimacy through a collaborative process of public debate is likely, in my opinion, to lead to far better and more transparent decisions being made.
By admin, on October 15th, 2009 Following on from John Banks’s public support of completing the CBD Rail Tunnel, it’s good to also see Len Brown show his support for this key project:
…it was interesting to see my fellow super-city mayoral contender John Banks proclaiming his enthusiasm for rail and an inner city loop connecting Britomart up with Mt Eden. He’s dead right. And I hope he’s sincere (given his recent comment that “if I wear my policy on my sleeve, I won’t get elected..”)
If so, we might see a genuine Auckland-wide consensus for major public investment into rail. Ensuring Auckland’s rail system gives as many people as possible an alternative option for travelling around the city has to be a major focus for the mayor of the new Auckland super city.
Transport Minister Stephen Joyce says he doesn’t want the new mayor to get carried away with plans for an inner-city rail loop and rail connection to Auckland International Airport. But it’s the mayor’s job to advocate and plan for what is important to Aucklanders – for what supports business by making employees more productive, and supports the community by improving everyone’s quality of life. It’s also the mayor’s job to make that happen.
Last year the Auckland Regional Transport Authority predicted that an inner rail loop, between Britomart and Mt Eden, would make downtown Auckland accessible to 370,000 people by train trips of 30 minutes or less. That’s 370,000 people, from across Auckland, who don’t have to sit for ages in slow-moving traffic just to get to work.
When combined with real travel choices and options, including bus and ferry, the difference that will make to our roads, lives and businesses is something worth working for.
During this campaign, I will advocate for all Auckland to ensure that an integrated, efficient transport system that provides real choice, and enhances all our lives, becomes a top priority in this city and with government.
And if I am elected mayor, I will ensure that we do what is necessary to get Auckland moving.
In all likeliness either John Banks or Len Brown will be the mayor of Auckland from October next year onwards. The mayor will have a lot of power under the system established in creating the Auckland Super City, so it is excellent to see that both the candidates will strongly support this critical project for Auckland.
Speaking of the CBD Rail Tunnel, there’s a quick update of where things are at with regard to this project in the ARC’s Transport and Urban Development Committee’s meeting agenda:
I’m certainly looking forward to seeing more detail on the alignment and station locations.
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