On Tuesday Generation Zero launched our Essential Budget, as an alternative to the Basic and Auckland Plans currently being consulted on as part of the Long Term Plan. We showed that Auckland could build the most transformation projects from the Auckland Plan for only $80 million per year, rather than the $300 million extra cost of the Auckland Plan.

The blog about the budget launch showed how we had broken spending down into broad categories. However the work we did behind this was at a detailed project level, using the full 10 year project list from the Regional Land Transport Plan.

Today I will outline the public transport and cycling projects to be built over the first 3 years of the plan, as this is where the most certainty around project costs and timeframes is. Note that almost all roading spend proposed under the Basic Transport Network will still proceed, as this is focussed around renewals, committed projects and safety works.

Under the Basic Transport Plan only the City Rail Link enabling works, and several already committed public transport projects will go ahead in the first 3 years. The only cycling investment to proceed at all will be the Waterview cycleway connection, which was required by Board of Inquiry for the Waterview Connection.

The Essential Transport Network includes a large number of additional projects that would otherwise need the full $300 million per annum of alternative funding to proceed in the next 3 years.

The largest single item is the Walking and Cycling Budget which gets over $30 million a year, up from just over $10 million in the current financial year. There is no further detail about what exact projects would proceed, however I would assume that the City Centre cycleways along Karangahape Road, Victoria Street, Quay Street, Nelson Street, Beaumont Street and Ian McKinnon Drive, as well as local connections to Skypath would be major beneficiaries. This would also enable Auckland Transport to take advantage of the government urban cycleways fund, so the money could be further topped up by the government. There is also a small amount of money for pram crossing upgrades, which should go someway towards fixing Auckland’s poor walkability, especially for the mobility impaired.

However overall Auckland’s bus network is the big winner. We get $9 million per year to deliver bus lanes, which should deliver significant progress across the city. In November Auckland Transport announced they would roll out 40km of bus lanes over the next 3 years, however the cost of this was only $15 million, so $28 million should get us nearly another 40km. Double Decker mitigation works get $18 million over 3 years, which should help increase capacity on some of our busiest bus corridors. Auckland Transport’s New Network will be able to proceed on time with new interchanges at Otahuhu and Manukau being built over the next year, as well as a number of smaller projects that will help people transfer between buses across the city. The long delayed Park and Ride at Silverdale can also be expanded. Normally we are not big fans of Park and Ride, however they are useful serving more dispersed areas like the Hibiscus Coast.

Two ferry projects are able to proceed. The major one is the “Downtown Ferry Basin Development”. Not much about this has been made public yet, however the RLTP does say this “improvements to provide additional berthage, improved safety and customer experience improvements”. Peak congestion at the Downtown Ferry terminal is well known by ferry users, so this should help resolve these issues. The next stage of the Devonport Ferry terminal upgrade can also proceed.

While the focus of the rail network is on the City Rail Link, upgrades of lower quality stations at Westfield, Takanini, Puhinui and Pukekohe are able to proceed, the Parnell station will be constructed, we will see more gating of stations and route protection for the very important Airport Rail project can proceed. Rail crossing separation will also be able to proceed. The $5.9 million should cover the replacement of the Sarawia St crossing (outside Newmarket) with a bridge over Cowie St, outside Newmarket station, which is becoming very congested with long waits for cars, and delays for trains waiting at Newmarket station.

Overall these projects combine to deliver significant improvements of public transport, walking and cycling over the next 3 years. Best of all this can be done less than 30% of the cost of the total Auckland Plan.

Please visit www.fixourcity.co.nz for more information, and read our full report here. An quick-submit form will be available on Monday so you can easily submit feedback to the Long Term Plan in favour of the Essential Budget.