Brian Rudman: Call off the prefects - and open the road

During the recent bus lockout, Auckland City traffic prefects were out and about as usual, snapping pictures of errant motorists taking advantage of the all but empty bus lanes. Among them were 116 offenders using the recently restored and re-opened Grafton Bridge.

During the lockout, offenders were sent an "advisory" notice. Last week, the council turned up the heat on bridge felons, issuing them with an official warning. The next step will be a $150 fine. But for what? Making use of an all but bus-free busway?

Sometime early next year, when the central connector busway linking the CBD up Symonds St and across Grafton Bridge to Newmarket is fully up and running, there could more than 60 buses an hour squeezing back and forth across the bridge at peak hour.

But until the end of November, that won't be the case. The only bus service now crossing the bridge is the Link bus, and anyone who has waited to catch one of those knows how infrequent they can be.

The explanation is reasonable enough. The construction of the busway up Symonds St and the $6.9 million strengthening of the bridge were completed well ahead of schedule, but there is still a bottleneck for buses further along the route at Park Rd, where the building of the new road bridge across the upgraded western railway line continues.

These roadworks won't be completed until late November, when it is planned to phase in some other services - possibly the Ellerslie/Panmure Highway buses.

But back to the present ... For the next month at least, despite only the Link bus trundling across it, Grafton Bridge is to be restricted to buses, cycles, motorcycles and emergency vehicles between 7am and 7pm on weekdays.

Council officials will waste their time snapping pictures, taking down number plates, and possibly fining car users who, on seeing an open stretch of roadway, make use of it.

I'm not against the central connector project, although like the Auckland District Health Board, I believe exceptions should be made for taxis visiting the Auckland Hospital complex from the west, and for private vehicles in emergencies.

But why enforce the weekday ban when it isn't necessary.

Auckland City's parking manager Rick Bidgood told a local paper last week that "there are some opportunists using it." He also thought some drivers had been confused during the lockout.

City council transport committee chairman Ken Baguley thought some miscreants might have had language problems and not been able to understand the English signs.

As far as the signs go, I can sympathise with them. Last week when I drove along Park Rd to the inviting, wide-open, empty bridge, the only sign I spotted was a trailer-mounted electronic affair which was difficult to read in daylight. It didn't help that it was plonked behind a lamp-post.

Ahead on the bridge were a car or two travelling in both directions, driven by an opportunist perhaps, or someone English-challenged, or who just assumed that a road is a road is a road ...

Unless you were a local, or like me, had followed the convoluted debate and knew of the working weekday ban, why would you, in its bus-free state, be looking for signs saying you couldn't use it.

Until the transport authority decides to put some buses on it, why don't the authorities just relax, and let everyone back on the bridge.

No doubt the bureaucrats will argue they're getting us into practice for when the buses suddenly come pouring over the hill in a month or so.

But all it's doing now is confusing and annoying people. When it suddenly fills up with buses, and some decent signs are erected, it will be bleedingly obvious to stay clear. Until then, what's the point of this ban?

Buried within a recent report on "stakeholder" reaction to the Park Rd busway project, is a cry for help from Auckland Museum. It might be slightly off the point, but it's a question that deserves an answer.

"We have been extremely frustrated by the inability of any public bus services to stop at the museum, or even within half a kilometre of the museum." It suggests it's time this was rectified.

As the old lady on the hill is about to celebrate her 80th birthday, what a good idea.