KEY POINTS:
Auckland Regional Council officers are recommending against any partnership between the public and private sectors for Transit NZ's $1.89 billion Waterview motorway tunnels project.
A report due for consideration by the council's transport committee, before submissions close on Friday on whether the Government should agree to form a public-private partnership (PPP), sees no advantage in using such a device to complete Auckland's western ring motorway network by 2015.
That is at variance with an acceptance by Auckland City Council's transport committee last week of a separate report favouring a PPP for the Waterview Connection, for which Transit wants to build twin tunnels from Richardson Rd in Mt Roskill to the Northwestern Motorway.
Consultant John Williamson reported to the city councillors that the cost associated with a PPP procurement process was likely to be insignificant compared with potential savings, in which every 1 per cent of cost reduction would equal $18 million.
He said it was unlikely the project could be completed by 2015 without alternatives to full Government funding, and road tolls would need to be considered irrespective of whether a PPP was formed.
Assuming tolls were to be adopted, a PPP would provide an opportunity to assess the desirability of transferring revenue risk from the public to the private sector.
A bid by Labour councillor Leila Boyle for a second month in succession for the committee to oppose tolling the new motorway was again lost on a casting vote by chairman Ken Baguley, of the majority Citizens and Ratepayers.
Councillors faced a picket on their arrival at the committee meeting, by members of a group called Citizens Against Privatisation.
Regional council staff do not share Mr Williamson's enthusiasm for private sector involvement.
Their report, for consideration by regional councillors on Wednesday, says Transit and Government funding agency Land Transport NZ have already in recent years developed procurement systems which are "much more flexible and innovative" than past practices in sharing risk between public-sector owners and private-sector road-builders.
These had led to alliances in which public and private sector construction partners shared gains and losses in projects such as the Grafton Gully extension to Spaghetti Junction, which was completed under budget and before schedule.
"The rigid model of lowest cost design-and-build contracting is no longer the only model for procurement of major transport projects in New Zealand," group transport manager Don Houghton and acting policy and planning chief Ann Magee say in their report.
The report describes the Waterview Connection as a pivotal element of a wider transport network, including public transport, walking and cycling integrated with land use development.
It fears isolating the motorway element with its own separate funding and management structure for up to 35 years will make it more difficult to achieve such integration.
"There is a risk that a PPP would focus on delivery of the major component of the transport corridor - the state highway tunnel - and the other transport components and changes to land use following the diversion of traffic from local roads on to the tunnel will be left to other agencies as 'nice to haves' rather than as integrated parts of the project."
But a second regional council staff report says the tunnels option has the potential to alleviate previous concerns about a more disruptive "cut and cover" motorway and recommends support in principle for the overall Waterview project, which it notes may lead to the creation of 18,000 new jobs in areas with better roading accessibility.
Transit says it has received several hundred responses to its public consultations on the project, but is urging more people to state their views before submissions close on Friday.
That is also the deadline for submissions to a separate steering group of Government and private-sector representatives, chaired by former Chief Ombudsman Sir Brian Elwood, on whether the project should be run as a PPP.
* Send submissions on the project to: waterview.connection@transit.govt.nz
* Send submissions on whether there should be a PPP to: waterview@treasury.govt.nz
