On the: Land Transport Management Bill
1. This Submission is from Robert Shaw a senior lecturer in business management at The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand and a member of the Regional Land Transport Committee for Wellington. He is a Porirua City Councillor and a former Wellington Regional Councillor.
2. I wish to appear before the Committee.
3. The key policy issue addressed here is how we will fund land transport. There are two options: fund strategically (regionally), or fund projects (nationally).
4. The new Act should make Transfund, Transit, territorial local authorities, and all other agencies involved, implement the Regional Land Transport Strategies. This is the only efficient way to integrate the development of a complex system (the alternative is to have one national agency doing everything).
In Wellington, we have probably spent about $2 million on the land transport strategy. It concludes with a practical list of ranked projects.
Our strategy is about the pursuit of strategic economic advantage for our region. It is not based on “transport” objectives at all. The transport objectives emerge from the economic and social objectives.
Central agencies then do their own planning, consult everyone again, and do projects that are different from those ranked highly in the strategy. Is it any wonder we do not make much progress?
Central agencies tend to fund transport objectives. Hence, they emphasise the flow of traffic, congestion, major intersections and motorways. This contrasts with the key goals in the Wellington strategy, and accordingly it is very unlikely the Wellington strategy will be implemented in the short- or medium-term.
As Wellington’s key projects keep getting pushed down the annual work programme lists of central agencies, we are forced to rework the analysis again and again. The strategy is an integrated development plan and if random pieces of it are implemented the rest gets thrown out of alignment. There are plenty of examples of ad hoc decision-making.
The Transmission Gully motorway and the central city by-pass, are examples of delayed projects repeatedly being re-evaluated. The upgrade of the state highway through Porirua City is an example of low priority work being done that exacerbates existing problems.
Central agencies should be obliged to implement regional strategies. Below I set out points that support this proposal.
Decision-making mechanism:
Regional strategy committees are large, but they bring together most of the interest groups and it is difficult for vested interests (be they a mode of transport or a geographical interest group) to gain excessive traction.
The “doing” agencies are already represented on the decision-making committees and much involved in the technical work that goes into the regional strategies. (In Wellington, we maintain a good level of understanding between agencies in this way, and generally a good level of cooperation over the technical work of planning.)
Central Government policy:
Central government rightly influences the regional strategies when it sets out national transport principles and priorities. These must be built into regional strategies. (In Wellington, we found when government issued its national statement we had already taken every aspect of the statement into account in building our strategy.)
Transfund’s role:
Transfund should not be involved at the level of project decision-making – they should divide the money on the base of competent strategies and focus on quality assurance issues.
Transfund should have an audit role regarding the strategies. They should ensure the strategies accord with central government policy and are technically sound, and deal adequately with boarder problems between neighbouring regions. They should require evidence of public consultation and proper process.
Gross funding and incentives:
Transfund will fund strategies essentially on population and geographic considerations. These base considerations will be moderated by the quality of the strategy, the state of development of regions, and perhaps to government priorities. Gross funding decisions will thus be directly linked to the quality of the planning. We may expect regions to work hard on their strategies and seek consensus within a region – otherwise they all sink together.
Wider issue, land use:
In the past the funding of projects as decided by a cost/benefit ratio has served New Zealand well. But we now must emphasise the wider objectives that underpin transport decisions. There are two areas of policy that must be addressed - the current one before the Committee (funding mechanism), and land use policy. The Committee may wish to consider how to integrate, on the one hand, land use policies as per the RMA, regional and district plans, and on the other hand, transport planning and funding decision-making.
Unless transport funding is based on strategic regional decision-making, this integration with land use policy will never be achieved. The cost to the country in people’s time, fuel, and environmental degradation is obviously enormous. The solution is actually quite cheap, but it will be very unpopular in some places because we are talking about land use plans that will impact negatively on people and businesses in the short term.
Tolls:
Tolls are one mechanism available to implement regional strategies. If decisions on tolls are to be made by Ministers, let us not tie the Minister down with lots of petty rules. We need here enabling legislation, not regulations. There will be so few applications that each Government can be left to determine its own policy and, in effect, cases can be considered on their merits. The case for a toll, and its detail, in the first instance must be set out in the regional strategy.
Mixed-use corridors:
Regional strategies need to address the question of utilities in rail and road corridors. The corridors are public land and have “mixed use”. Everyone with an interest in the use of the corridors should have an opportunity to be consulted and to debate local policy as the land transport strategy is developed. I refer to the interests of telecommunications, gas, electricity, rail, water and waste utility operators.
Designation of state highways:
The designation of state highways should be set out in the land transport strategy. National policy can provide criteria on this. The representative nature of the committees makes them ideal for this work, as does their level of local knowledge.
Pedestrians and cyclists:
Obviously, every regional strategy needs to set out appropriate provisions for all forms of transport, including walking and bicycles. (In Wellington, we have faced problems with boundaries between cities.)
Robert Shaw