Petrol, Public transport, Peak oil and Pessimism

As an Aucklander, something that I quite honestly cannot live without is my car. It sounds terrible doesn’t it, being so reliant on a heap of metal and yet I am. My car gets used at least 6 days a week and I can’t even begin to imagine how I would manage to get around in my day to day life without it. Thats not to say that I don’t use public transport, I do, however I have to drive my car to get to a bus station on the North Shore because the buses near my house leave a lot to be desired. For me that is the most important point. If I could get around on public transport more then I would, I genuinely quite like hoping on a bus; it gives me time to do readings for uni, listen to my ipod, it can be cheaper than driving and who doesn't enjoy a bit of people watching?
 Unfortunately Auckland’s public transport, or lack of, makes using public transport particularly difficult.

This spiel does actually have a purpose. The other day I was listening to National Radio and they mentioned a media release made by Auckland Transport. The link is below but here is a quick summary

·         there were over 7million passenger journeys during March in Auckland

·         this is the first time passenger journeys have exceeded that number in decades

·         for the 12 months to March 2011 the patronage on Auckland public transport was 64,581,631. This was an increase of 8.3% (4,971,450 boardings)

·         the Chief Executive of Auckland Transport gave three reasons for this increase

1.       quality facilities and reliable services

2.       students returning to tertiary study

3.       the rising cost of petrol

 http://www.aucklandtransport.govt.nz/about-us/News/LatestNews/Pages/Media-Release-7-million-public-transport-journeys.aspx

To be honest I think the most important factor out of those three is the rising cost of petrol. If there is one thing that will push people out of their cars and into public transport it is the rising cost of filling up their cars. It’s a slightly pessimistic view of the human race but one that I think is valid. It is easy to understand why, especially in place like Auckland, people are so reliant on cars; it is significantly easier to get to where you need to go, you can get there when it suits you (i.e. you’re not reliant on a timetable) and whenever you travel it is in your happy little car bubble which is at the perfect temperature, eating and drinking is allowed and you can sing along to whatever music you feel like, as loud as you want.

Furthermore the design of Auckland supports the car, how many people actually live near where they work/go to uni/have family etc. Hardly anyone! Auckland City, as a result of its geographical shape and the general design, sprawls over a large area. And as I mentioned in one of my first posts the only reason why it is limited to that area is the MUL which has the potential to change.

This in itself is an issue that is looked at in Auckland’s Spatial Plan in the ‘People and Place’ section on page 125 and 126. The Plan basically sets out the pros and cons of the MUL as follows

Support	Criticisms
Protects wider environmental values	Reduces the supply of land for urban development
Allows concentration of infrastructure over a smaller area and therefore lowers its cost due to the higher population density	Force land prices up which effects affordability of residential and business activities
Protection of rural areas	The dispersed land-use pattern that comes as a result of no MUL is a more resilient pattern of development and can handle large environmental change better

My issue with the removal of the MUL is that development will continue to spread further away from Auckland City which will encourage more people to use their cars.

This leads me to my next point which, in itself is a huge issue peak oil. Not something that is fun for anyone really when you consider how reliant the human population is in general on oil.

Oil is a finite resource which means that at some point the oil that humans can access will run out. Oil itself may not get completely used, but the oil that humans can easily access will without a doubt be used up, after which the extraction of oil will become significantly more difficult, expensive and dangerous. There is some contention over when peak oil will actually happen or if we have already passed the peak. Unfortunately it is one of those annoying benchmarks that you can only tell you have passed once you have passed it.

The video below shows one interpretation of peak oil which I have to say I think is quite clever.

So what will happen as petrol prices inevitably continue to rise? Well for one thing more and more people will be having trouble affording the driving habit. This will mean that people start to turn towards public transport as an alternative to cars and this is where Auckland runs into another problem – our unimpressive public transport options. Auckland does not currently have the transport infrastructure to be able to deal with a significant increase in people using public transit. This is especially true for Britomart which is almost running at its peak and has no room to expand as well as the Northern Express buses on the Shore (good luck finding a park in one of the park and ride carparks).

So where does that leave us?

Updates continued and a dash of opinion

Ok so the second update I received was regarding the two motorway extensions happening in the area as part of the Western Ring Route. The SH18 Hobsonville Deviation and the SH16 Brigham Creek Deviation will be opening early! (assuming all continues as planned).

Below is a photo from the pamphlet which shows an aerial view Hobsonville Road interchange and the SH18-SH16 flyover. The photo looks west towards Westgate shopping centre, Massey and Royal Heights.

The photo demonstrates the massive area that is involved in the construction of the motorway. 2 years ago this area looked completely different its hard to even picture it.

Of course it is an achievement to finish a project of this magnitude early and I'm sure a significant number of people had to work very hard to manage it, but I find it seriously hard to comprehend why new roads are continually being built around Auckland.

For me it seems blindingly obvious. Petrol prices continue to rise and while we may get the odd joyful moment of a reduction in prices, in reality they will continue to climb. So then why are more roads built? Shouldn't we be encouraging people to find alternate ways to travel?

These are all things I plan on focusing on in my next few posts but for now I will leave you with some thought provoking quotes.

"The automobile has not merely taken over the street, it has dissolved the living tissue of the city.  Its appetite for space is absolutely insatiable; moving and parked, it devours urban land, leaving the buildings as mere islands of habitable space in a sea of dangerous and ugly traffic." 

~James Marston Fitch, New York Times, 1 May 1960"

It wasn't the Exxon Valdez captain's driving that caused the Alaskan oil spill.  It was yours." 

~Greenpeace advertisement, New York Times, 25 February 1990

"A commuter tie-up consists of you - and people who for some reason won't use public transit." 

~Robert Brault

Updates!

So apparantly it has been all go in west Auckland of late. We very kindly recieved two updates in the mail in regards to two posts I made.

The first was in regards to the Hobsonville Point development and their plans to build a new primary and secondary school at the Point. Not all that exciting really, new schools get built all the time right?

except . . .

these will be the first schools in New Zealand built under PPP or a public-private partnership (depending on, ofcourse, the putting foreward of satisfactory bids). As outlined on the press release kindly delivered to my letterbox, a school PPP would basically mean that the private sector would esentially be responsible over a 25yr period, for the school including the design, building, maintenance and finance. The education side of things would stay in the realm of the board of trustees.

New Zealand seems to have a bit of a history of being quite wary of PPPs (especially of the infrastructure variety), although they are used fairly regularly overseas.

There are naturally some pros and cons to PPPs
pros
- project risk (such as design and construction risks) are are shifted to the private sector
- potential for better value for money
- the public sector can focus fully on students and their learning
- potential for better service provision

cons
- public perception regarding the loss of a 'public asset' for a long period of time
- need to be fitted into a some form of long-term plan (this is really only a con if it isnt properly intergrated into such plans)
- conflict of interests
- negative effects on the purpose of educational institutions

As I mentioned above, New Zealanders certainly tend to be hesitant about PPPs. Personally I think that it is a good approach to take. Any business deal should be approached with caution and the Government needs to make sure that the limits of control of the private sector a clearly set to ensure no cross-over into the education side of things.

Below is a fitting cartoon I found online, just as a little something extra to think about!
I will leave it there for the moment and put the other update in a new post since this one went a bit longer than what I was expecting.