These issues are too important to play political?

As for the North Shore busway, it's useless to this Shore Boy. Suspect I'd feel different about it if I could?

While it might be "heaps", it's not enough. Consider the CBD Rail Loop business case (pp. 30-31):

Without the CBD Rail Link, Auckland CBD would require twin or triple bus lanes (both sides of road)
on most corridors and,?

That slows buses down. Then there's?

Personally, I find it very difficult to understand what seems not just reticence,?

Personally, I find it very difficult to understand what seems not just reticence, but outright hostility towards funding a rail loop and a CBD tunnel. In my view, that's the *least* possible work that can be done to build a viable long term transport system.

Given the downsides of building?

Though I would add that there's a significant historical/ideological context in the way that rail infrastructure was deliberately neglected and degraded since?

I am hostile to a?

i'm lead to believe it's much more simple that than, lobbyists, and highways in national seats. it's much the same with the broadband roll-out. NRT had an?

the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, the IEA and the Saudis think that peak oil is already here, or has been and gone.

it's only the GFC that has blunted the impact.

Unless they *make* employers allow telecomuteing or radically change the nature of business ownership, it isn't going to make a?

I agree with pretty much everything you say in terms of a harbour crossing and the necessity of the MUL. However, I disagree completely with what you have to say about transport.

First reason – the assertion?

What counts as "Auckland" in those tables? Because the population is listed at a smidgen over 1.1 mil versus the figure of 1.4 mil that is bandied around most often about?

Measuring population density is always a bit of a "dark art". Where does a city actually end, should we count parks & other open spaces? Should we count lakes and rivers? How about?

Also, the tunnel isn't just about bringing people?

But no, sack one lot of?

Even if that isn't true a decent rail network?

Auckland is most certainly higher density than Brisbane & Perth: two cities with extremely popular rail systems that continue to be expanded.

Also two cities on flat land.

I agree with Mark.Rickerby that binary thinking on this is crazy. It's OK to "just say" that, without fingering anyone specifically (which only?

However, the use of narrow gauge in New Zealand has?

Three on-ramps in a row were closed (NW-->N, Wellington st., and Fanshawe st.) leaving a backlog of traffic from Curran st. (the only active northern on-ramp), back to Victoria Park.

Now,?

The richest people in any country are generally the most productive* (per capita). And you point out that they work in the CBD. I forsee antipathy in gifting rich people $2 billion plus in anything (including this train set). Mine is not a minority view.

If these rich people?

Not really. National won just about every rural electorate, as this map shows.

What's more concerning is that branch lines are being closed because they're under-used due to their shit condition, which takes away the option of rail delivery of?

If the whole country benefits, why should only the users pay? IBM?s survey published a couple of days ago put the drag on Auckland?s economy from congestion at 2-4% of regional GDP, which comes to billions of dollars a?

RMTU general secretary Wayne Butson told NZPA there were concerns about the locomotives because "they look bloody heavy".

and:

KiwiRail's mechanical general manager Lloyd Major said the locos had been weighed and were 105 tonnes, which was lighter than the electric locos (EFs) that currently run between?

new mainline locos haven?t been built here for decades.

I got to help photograph the Addington Rail workshops when they were decommissioned and then demolished ? sadly they destroyed the workers hall as well ? I have never been in a lovelier hall, all wood and warm feelings? I also?

Plus the fact that road freight pays only 56% of the cost it imposes on the roading system (wear & tear), whereas rail pays 82%.?

Are your photos online anywhere?

And the trucking lobby managed to astroturf its way out of doing so.

Incredibly, with the support of all the user-pays polly tubbies in the House. Act couldn't get on board the "Evil Labour are out to screw truckies" wagon fast enough. It was quite the exercise in cognitive dissonance.

http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/culture/rail-tourism/railways-studios

Your point (unless you have changed it) is that the workers of the CBD are highly productive. My point is that the productive workers of the CBD are highly renumerated for their productivity. Complimenting (not ignoring) your point. The idea of a rail tunnel through the Auckland CBD is?

Then the benefits for the wider region won?t be morally sullied by bourgeois Queen Street types zipping around downtown and flashing their big?

ETA: Snap! It's not polite to edit your entire post and change its thrust :P

Truth be told, I?ve long thought the idea of a Central Post Office was suspect too ? such a big lavish building just for townie snobs to post their letters.

I'm still baffled that Angus portrays this is a corporate welfare issue.
I understand people from other regions resenting money being spent on Auckland, though there are plenty out there who can?

Period.

I've just driven 150km this afternoon through Santa Monica, Downtown LA, Orange County, Newport Beach, Long Beach, and back to SaMo past LAX.

More roads=more traffic.

Carpool lanes, even carpool lanes that have their own dedicated additional fricking flyover that goes from the centre lane?

This argument would have more credibility if the CBD wasn't the transport hub. Is there any public transport from the shore to the airport, that doesn't require entering the CBD?

What about the punters going to?

Exactly. Mentioned upthread #horsetowater

I don't resent national money being spent?

I'm not sure what you are reading – examples welcome. I've always heard Aucklanders acknowledge the rest of the?

Not trying to get into an argument about this, but Auckland has the biggest gap between taxes paid and taxes returned and that?s down to the density?

DHB funding for ambulance and local hospital services would be quite stretched by the low population density too. But?

Actually I'm somewhat cynical that you could get the Minister in question to move beyond smug relaxation about it. But that's what's needed – leadership rather than snivelling. Action. Ambition. Decency.

Yeah. Right.

There are public toilets in our camp ground – we do have a grant from the WDC, to assist with keeping them clean, but a substantial part of the monies for running them comes from the OCA.
And – apropos your other wee shitty comment – there?

?to get them to take our infected waters seriously.

perhaps you have to put a real ?motion? before them?
a grassroots movement to stop grass top movements?
but seriously it would a tragedy if Okarito was to become known as ?the great heron after? ??

True in many places, sadly.

And I think you're under-rating the increasing concentration of pooing cattle as?

That can work when the individual poo sites are very widely distributed, eg off infrequently used tracks in the bush. Once there's a lot of crap in one area, human or bovine, nature gets overloaded fast.

The reason those ponds exist is to catch all the shit that?

– Wellington's apartment boom (from 2006)
– Avoiding Auckland's shoe box surplus
-'Go up' to tackle housing unaffordability

And to Richard: from the first article I cited, high-density and physical exercise aren't mutually exclusive:

We play?

I'd say the public case about threshold global scale has not been?

I think it's fair for them to be worried about a unified Auckland?

For the record, I've never understood the supposed antipathy-towards-Auckland that is supposed to exist in the South. I have friends and family who live there (or within the environs) and there is no?

gold, Sacha, pure gold-

I haven't heard anyone suggesting that trains are a cure-all for Auckland's transport woes?

Richard, nice to have you commenting.
It's less that trains are "seen as a cure all" than that they're going to be largely?

They both sound like pretty awful arguments to?

You'd have?

While there are some rather dubious aspects to the above plan, like the eastern motorway, there is also a?

Well, we hope. But the current government are pretty anti the MUL, and if they successfully get it ditched then increasing density is going to be difficult because the Council will be?

And relaxing the MUL's, in spite of all the spin,?

Not that there are any wealthy land-bankers rubbing their hands together with glee or anything..

Of course not. That has nothing whatsoever to do with Joyce's view that the MUL is an evil communist plot to govern how people live. As opposed to urban sprawl around roads, which is a?

I think we know who the author is, and he wasn't too fond of Len Brown to begin with. When?

I think "bunch of evidence-free clowns" is probably the best summation of Granny's editorial?

Ideally the likes of PWC or the Economist would give it the Think Big/pork barrel stigma, but we?

reckon

Please do – someone has to, given the feeble opposition on offer. The raw facts and analysis are there from parties like the Campaign for Better Transport and transportblog.co.nz. Some added marketing/political oomph?

Then who? Nicky Hager? WikiLeaks? The Sierra Club?

Please do?

What I want to know is, who owns the land adjacent to the said Highway? They must be expecting some serious increases in land value. I have also heard it said that Stephen?

Did anyone know about This before it happened?
Trams are expected to run on Auckland's waterfront by August in an $8 million project which saw the first modest section of tracks laid this week.

And how much tram-way do you get for $8mill ?

Sounds more like?

Safety expert explains how to lower the road toll

__"Although wire rope barriers are already installed in some places, Matthew-Wilson says that in most cases the barriers are not installed because they would slow down traffic, especially trucks.

?Everyone agrees that separating opposing lanes of?

$8m will get you 1.5km of track with overhead wires, plus lease of a couple of trams.?

but 1.5 km ? That IS a kiddie ride. I'd rather walk and keep my $2 or whatever it is they'll be charging...

I?

(& in fact personally speaking, it's been pretty harmful, given that I've fallen off my bike when my front wheel has got trapped in the the tram tracks.)