Tyre man says keep the Northern line
Vryn Evans July 2006
Newlands resident Vryn Evans is a colourful character
but blunt when it comes to speaking him mind. He is
a man who has a truth based world view.
Vryn has a historical memoryof a New Zealand where you
had to think carefully how you spent hard earned currency.
"As a child we caught trains everywhere", he said when I
recently spoke to him about the Johnsonville line and the
proposal to rip up the rails.
You might think that a tyre man wouldn't have
much time for rail but this is where Vryn Evans shows
a civic minded tradition of reflecting on the public
interest. He draws very clear distinctions between self-
interest and community interest.
Vryn Evans argues that we badly need to plan a 100 years ahead.
Looking past the present time of problematic oil and petrol
supply, he puts a strong case for public transport for daily
use and for the private motor vehicle going back to its earlier role
of intermittent recreational use only. We didn't use the family car
much when I was young.
While Vryn is without a doubt a car
enthusist he acknowledges that the options private transport offer
have a downside. Living post cheap oil means greater attention
needs to be given to energy efficiency and life style. Part of that
equation is rail and light rail as a people carrier, Evans argues.
posted by pepptalk at 10:07 PM
5 Comments:
From: Burma Road Tyres [mailto:burmardtyres@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Wednesday, 12 July 2006 12:33 p.m.
To: BRYAN PEPPERELL
WELLINGTON'S IMPENDING PROBLEMS OF PUBLIC TRANSPOPRT AND TRAFFIC CONGESTION.
Without doubt the local region and local councils have no real committment toward long term strategy planning taking us toward the next century. As usual short term fixes are proposed to solve what is becoming a long term problem. Unfortunately,like so many infrastructual needs that become necessity, an ongoing raft of surveys, committees and bureaucratic processes- all very costly in themselves- become the "norm" with nothing of real vision or progress being made. A hotchpotch of on again/offagain transpoprt and roading proposals and a minor tweaking here and there is endemic of what Wellington's regional populace have to endure. I sometimes wonder if Wellingtonians really care anyway ?
From: Burma Road Tyres [mailto:burmardtyres@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Wednesday, 12 July 2006 5:10 p.m.
To: BRYAN PEPPERELL
Subject: CONTINUATION OF WELLINGTON"s FUTURE TRANSPORT WOES
As per my last email re above topic, it is high time that the NZ Bus $ Coach Association (or whatever they call themselves) who use the Mana/Newlands Bus colours and who were very active on last weekend with school children plus a stall in the Johnsonville Mall, promoting the exclusive use of bus transport as the way of the future for Wellington's passenger requirements,were given a counter argument as to why their exclusivity bus concept is totally flawed.
Naturally they are promoting commercial self-interests and with their failed attempt to become the monopoly transport operator in the region they will take whatever means available to firmly entrench their views and support. It is becoming increasingly evident that the current cabal of Wn.City Councillors have no interest in alternative public transport which would,of course,require a massive financial inputs from local and central government regardless of the very long term viability of light rail to move masses of passengers with least inconvenience to the roading system (which currently in itself has become below international standards I'm informed).
Arguably, the current WCC tunnel vision extends into building stadiums, sports areanas.,and suchlike which have far more emotive appeal, than dealing with visionary transport infrastructure. Councillors would rather have a cheap fix enabling them to continue spending millions of ratepayer-funded monies on the gloss without dealing with the future infrastructural transport needs
From: Burma Road Tyres [mailto:burmardtyres@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Thursday, 13 July 2006 4:14 p.m.
To: Bryan Pepperell
Subject: Re: CONTINUATION OF WELLINGTON"s FUTURE TRANSPORT WOES
Expanding on Wellington's impending Transport woes, as time permits I will further comment.
Let's all be sensible and non-emotive, let's all stand back and take an eagle's eye view on the topographic nature of the greater Wellington region casting aside parochialism and as I've said before, become visionary. Reality is that in any of the world's cities where the needs for moving the populace has/is clearly identified,various solutions to great effect have been implemented. I've never said that there is no place for bus transport - what I've always advocated is that we must avoid at all costs substituting one form of motor vehicle for another which in itself, simply fuells one type of vehicle congestion for another.
In my opinion, it is a combination of bus/light rail that Wellington needs now. Buses to provide public transport connections to and from the light rail stations where it is technically impracticable to implement the rail service and to provide a bus system for lightly populated parts of Wellington region where a rail system is not justified in the immediate.
In forthcoming decades, arguably road buses will be fuelled by alternates to fossil fuel,with fuelling infrastructure to cater for it. If New Zealand and Wellington in particular can get past the crock of the stifiling Resource management Act and gets on with wind power for electric generation for example, many of the problems that are now occuring regarding electric power generation would be minimalised. Just as motorised transport i.e.buses will become hybrid combinations/non-fossil fuelled or whatever technology is developed, the same applies to light rail which obviously requires some form or another of "fuelling source".. it will not be the exclusive domain of road vehicles/transport where such replacement for fossil fuel is focussed.
Unquestionably,the provision of technically advanced,modern, comfortable light rail developed for the needs of our region is being overshadowed by the quick fix mentality which unfortunately pervades in central/local governments and their plethora of bureaucracies with as I've said before, spend our money creating working parties. committees, discussion groups,then spend thousands of dollars by introducing "specialist consultants", who produce screeds of reports and"findings" requiring even more reports from working parties etc. Surely a classic case is the current nonsense of an alternate exit/entry route beyond Paremata- piecemeal development of that area northwards and complete lack of interest, vision and determination has now created a complete botch-up where we are now faced with an improbable expensive and stupid solution with a local MP trumpeting the case for political point scoring ! (But this roading saga is another story)
Of course,any major light rail, in whatever permutation is finally decided upon will require a huge funding, far beyond buying a second hand or new bus, this is undeniable. But once spent wisely, this cost is spread over 50 to 60 years and perhaps beyond and once in place, rail expansion and upgrading (as opposed to the complete song and a prayer attitude the New Zealand rail system has become ) the Wellington region will have one of the world's finest mass transportation if it is done right. " Do it once, do it right" must be the motto. .
If Wellington citizens are really passionate about the future transport needs for our region (which I unfortunately feel they are not) we will not be bullied into accepting a second rate,low rent quick fix that a bus only system is. Furthermore, buses consume many fossil based consumables, tyres, oils etc. and currently dump a quantifiable amount of pollutants in and around our area- although to be fair with the slowly introduced better diesel fuel and better "exhaust scrubbing" devices the opportunity exists to reduce these levels on the more technically advanced buses that conform to EuroIV and Euro V regulations.
Meantime we must not let the opportunity to get a decent light rail system implemented now, slip away. It is critical to our thinking that central and local government politicians are "employed by the election process" to serve the public who put them there, this is not a grey area. Unfortunately, too many of these elected representatives , once installed in office
implant their 'party" agendas on us and more often than not , the important and basic public opinions on infrastructural visions go unheeded. If we do not address our light rail option future generations will rue the day.
Buses to provide public transport connections to and from the light rail stations where it is technically impracticable to implement the rail service and to provide a bus system for lightly populated parts of Wellington
That's a good point. In many ways its the crux of the issue - how do we handle the fact that rail can't serve everyone?
In answering that question, it's important to draw a distinction between standard bus transport, and bus transport on a dedicated busway. The latter combines the wide reach of a bus service with the speed and reliability of rail.
I'd encourage everyone involved in this debate to familiarise themselves with the implications of the busway option.
For instance, I notice that Vryn Evans lives in Newlands. Retaining rail will do nothing for Newlands residents (except doom them to increasing congestion on the Gorge). On the other hand, the busway will give Newlands residents a reliable seamless service, unaffected by traffic congestion.
I've writtem more on this subject here: http://betterbus.blogspot.com/2006/07/rant-support-busway.html
From: Burma Road Tyres [mailto:burmardtyres@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Wednesday, 30 August 2006 12:51 p.m.
To: BRYAN PEPPERELL
Subject: WELLINGTON REGIONS TRANSPORT FUTURE
Interesting how Mr Rusk touched on where I live which is in my view irrelevant. Newlands for many decades has had a serving bus service and I do not know where Mr Rusk gets the impression that I would expect any rail system to serve every nick and cranny of Wellington suburbs, which would be nonsense and technically ridiculous.
Historically, New Zealand's rail system has been neglected insofar as passenger transport is concerned to what ( under a government "broken promise" of non- private ownership) now has emphasis on moving freight, with little or no interest in "loss producing" passenger services.,with constant examination of whether to keep rail routes intact on the basis of commercial viability as one would expect a business operation to do these days to keep shareholders intact.
I will continue to advocate for long term quality rail system to bring New Zealand into the 21st century. I've never advocated a no bus transport service but a sensible, modern network/service supplemented by road buses for obvious reasons. Advocates of a no rail bus only system, in my opinion are simplistically trying to provide a short term fix for a long term problem. It is highly unlikely bus operators will wish to lose the substantial taxpayer cross subsidies paid them, just as passenger rail also has to rely upon the same.
This situation of public transport will ever remain a hot topic simply on the basis of vested interests alone. Local/central governments can find money at the blink of an eye to fund other than infrastructal needs,every dollar of which is that much less to update and develop a long term passenger transport system. I again remind the bus-only advocates how the late Sir Dove-Meyer Robinson, Mayor of Auckland was scorned, laughed at and ignored when he continually preached the need to develop a modern "light rail " network to embrace the fast and ever expanding population/suburban sprawl which that city is now suffering. Bring on the buses was the comments from his opponents who said that road transport would look after Auckland's needs, and build bigger and better linking motorways which would solve the problems. Wellington under the blinkered short term local and central government politicians, their bureaucratic "masters", and the non-visionary "rid of the rail" advocates will live to see a duplication of the Auckland problems in the Capial City.
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