KEY POINTS:
Auckland Regional Council members want more than one option left open for motorway tunnels under Waitemata Harbour - even at a potential $5 billion-plus cost.
The council's transport committee yesterday endorsed a route between Esmonde Rd on the Northern Motorway and central Auckland via the western side of Wynyard Pt as its preference for a harbour crossing comprising a pair of three-lane motorway tunnels and two single-track railway tubes.
But although it believes that will remain the best route for an extension of Auckland's passenger-rail network to North Shore City, it will ask Transit NZ to keep open the possibility of a longer and more expensive crossing for the motorway tunnels.
That would allow traffic to bypass central Auckland by running State Highway 1 between Esmonde Rd and Grafton, providing what consultants - in a joint study on behalf of Transit, the regional council, its transport agency and Auckland and North Shore cities - acknowledge would be a more "resilient" motorway network.
But the consultants estimate the overall cost of the longer motorway route, plus the more direct rail crossing, at $4.7 billion to $5.1 billion.
That would be about $1 billion more than running all four tunnels between North Shore and Wynyard Pt, including a motorway tunnel to Spaghetti Junction and a rail link pointing at Britomart or a future inner-city underground loop for electric trains.
Noting the tunnels were likely to take 20 to 40 years to develop, the regional councillors decided the longer motorway route should be protected "to adapt to any changes in circumstances in the intervening period".
Their resolution follows Transit's endorsement of the more direct route for all four tunnels as its preferred option, and a decision by the Auckland Regional Transport Authority to support only a rail crossing.
West Auckland councillor Paul Walbran said he was disappointed the authority had taken "a fairly narrow view" by concentrating on public transport rather than acting as "an integrating agency" by considering roading connections as well.
Council chairman Mike Lee, who was worried about an earlier proposal by Transit to dig a "cut and cover" tunnel through the Wynyard Quarter redevelopment precinct, said the preferred option of a deep bored tunnel to the west was a sound one.
The latest study, which began by considering 159 crossing possibilities, had produced far more impressive results than earlier expensive and "self-indulgent, bureaucratic" planning exercises.
He said the longer motorway route to Grafton retained some very attractive elements in offering greater transport resilience and a more balanced development of Auckland's central business district, and should therefore be protected.
Transport committee chairwoman Christine Rose welcomed "encouraging directives" of Transit's board in support of adding cycling and walking links to the existing harbour bridge, hopefully in conjunction with a $45 million structural strengthening project due to start next month.
That followed its reception last week of a delegation from Cycle Action Auckland, Walk Auckland and a Cancer Society health-promotion manager, after which Transit acting chairman Bryan Jackson said the board supported the promotion of cycling as a transport option.
The groups are concerned a feasibility study of allowing pedestrians and cyclists on the bridge will not be completed before the end of June.
