Emergency services attend the scene of a truck crash on the North Shore southbound approach to the Auckland Harbour Bridge. Photo / Antony Gray
The chaos on the Auckland Harbour Bridge (NZ Herald, September 3) highlights once again the lack of resilience and forward thinking in transport planning. The incumbent mayor wants to do nothing until 2030. His main competitor has a scheme to build a double-decker bridge which
will do little to improve the wider Auckland transport network.
The solution is simple. As soon as the CRL tunnelling machine is finished around 2023, use it to tunnel under the harbour from the bottom of Stanley St to Bayswater with a bridge or causeway to connect to SH1. A separated walkway and cycle way will connect Bayswater with the shore path and Skypath, enabling walking and cycling from Bayswater to the CBD via the current harbour bridge.
This tunnel and connecting road will provide an alternative to the harbour bridge, declutter spaghetti junction, enable residents in the eastern suburbs to get to North Shore and Bayswater and Takapuna residents to get to the CBD much more easily. Cargo moving north will avoid the central city and harbour bridge.
Introduce the Supermaxx public transport proposal, providing a vastly improved network and schedules and a 30-day unlimited travel pass of $70 from Albany to Papakura or $90 from Wellsford to Waiuku and we will have a highly functioning transport network.
Failure to implement Supermaxx by Mayor Goff during the past three years has cost Auckland ratepayers and commuters over $500 million in excess subsidies and fares.
Stephen Greenfield, Auckland Transport Consultancy.
One thing is for sure, measles vaccinations need to be much easier to get. You cannot get them at the 24-hour White Cross and you cannot get them from any doctor if you are not registered with them. Even then, you can only get them Monday to Friday, 9am-5am and that is if you have a doctor.
This is not helpful for the many people who are not registered with a particular doctor or cannot get time off during the day.
Jane Canter, Te Atatu South.
I watched Monday evening's mayoral debate with a sense of despair as I listened to the usual talk of climate change and inequality.
While these may be real concerns, they are concerns, surely, for central government and not local bodies.
I desperately wanted to hear a candidate say that they would scrap any further talk of light rail, which will only congest already congested roads.
That they would, in partnership with central government, complete the development of electric rail, by extending the existing heavy rail to Wellsford and Pukekohe, including Auckland airport and the North Shore, along dedicated rail corridors.
As well as getting cars off the roads, this would allow for the planning of satellite townships, with schools, roads, sewage, and everything else based around one integrated heavy rail network.
Of course, I was disappointed. I will have to resign myself to the reality that we have no one in central or local government, who has the vision and intelligence to see what Auckland needs, and the will to make it happen.
Euan Macduff, Titirangi.
Now that we are to have a dedicated cancer agency (NZ Herald, September 2), it is time to make brachytherapy for prostate cancer publicly funded.
This simple and effective treatment (implanted radiation seeds) has been available for many years for localised prostate cancer, but only to the wealthy or those who can afford the insurance that will cover it.
The current publicly funded option, beam radiation, is prolonged over several weeks at the linear accelerator centre and causes serious side effects. Brachytherapy has fewer side effects and the procedure can be completed in a few minutes in one visit to a clinic.
Bill Keir, Hokianga.
What is sport? It's a form of "play", and when it starts to become competitive and serious, some young people can make the transition and some struggle to do so (NZ Herald, September 3). We need to accept that, and not force children to "like" their chosen sport. Teens are dropping out of organised sport because they identify other distractions that hold their interest more. A lot of the pressure exerted on children in sport comes from parents, seeking self -gratification through their child's prowess.
John Walsh, Green Bay.
It appears that Megan Woods MP is the victim of some snake oil salesman (NZ Herald, September 3).
Hydrogen is non polluting when it is used but it has many problems in its production and storage.
It needs to be made by some means, traditionally by spraying water on burning coal, does any one see an anomaly here? It can also be made by hydrolysis of water, which is not actually very efficient, and requires electricity, which could be used to power cars. Hydrogen is a light gas and needs to be cooled to about minus 250 degrees, which is energy intensive and hard to maintain. The safety aspects of transporting are horrendous.
Hydrogen technology is incredibly undeveloped and, when I see a politician announcing an innovation as a New Zealand first, I become sceptical.
Hydrogen used to be, along with carbon monoxide, an ingredient in coal gas as reticulated in many New Zealand cities, and this 200-year-old technology is being promoted in Australia where mining and burning coal is acceptable.
The concept of producing 56g of carbon dioxide to make 2g of hydrogen is incredibly wasteful.
Stop being stupid with our money.
Neville Cameron, Coromandel.
The promise by John Key regarding recovery of the bodies of the Pike River miners (NZ Herald, September 4) has been a subject of discussion going back to 2012.
Despite denials and fabrications the previously unseen video played on TV3 cannot be refuted. In that interview John Key said, quote: "The first thing is I'm here to give you absolute reassurance we're committed to getting the boys out, and nothing's going to change that. So - when people try and tell you we're not, they're playing, I hate to say it, but they're playing with your emotions."
Unfortunately, despite his best intentions and other expert opinions those words became embedded in the minds of the families of the miners and they will hang on to that hope unless convinced otherwise. It is sincerely hoped that this re-entry will have a satisfactory outcome for all.
Reg Dempster, Albany.
What an example of courage and informed social conscience shown in the photo you published of the peaceful protest of gasmasked St Francis' Canossian college students in Hong Kong (NZ Herald, September 3).
When the stakes for freedom are so high and the rest of the free world is largely turning blind eyes, those young ladies show a desire for social justice and maturity beyond their years.
The refusal of an authoritarian regime to honour even the provisions of the "one-country, two-systems" accord, let alone human rights, is despicable. Hong Kong's leader is right: she is forced to follow two masters, and not one of those is the will of a free people.
We need to show solidarity for the brave citizens of Hong Kong before it is too late. We also need to remind China's politburo that when generations of family members ditch the top-down thing and go flatting, no amount of physical or emotional duress will make them respect you. Or re-unify you in any meaningful way.
Steve Liddle, Napier.
I am a Registered Nurse with 34 years' clinical experience and responding to your correspondent Sally Shaw regarding Caring Nurses (NZ Herald, September 3).
To suggest that nurses trained in the hospital system, are more caring and better educated than the present day tertiary-trained nurses is antiquated and lacking in any connection to the reality.
Both systems have produced strong, committed nurses.
Nurses currently have never been better educated, and can and do enter all manner of post graduate programmes. Increasingly complex, and concentrated patient case-loads challenge present day nurses to adapt and think critically.
I work with young registered nurses. They are bright, compassionate, and bring a new outlook to our profession.
Real nurses and doctors take the load off each other every day, by supporting one another in a focused, common purpose, in an environment of mutual respect.
Gordon Love, Onehunga.
Most affluent cities in the world developed around a port or river crossing. The richest and largest cities in the world still tend to have large and efficient ports. Ports are the stimulus for many other industries. This is the basis of much employment and wealth. Shifting Auckland port would not only add costs to all imported goods destined for the local market and reduce income for exporters (having to ship goods further to get to a port), but effectively sabotage the larger Auckland economy.
Auckland and New Zealand cannot afford to consider destroying so much of our natural advantage and ongoing basis of our wealth. Let's support our port and be proud of it and tell the Wellington bureaucrats to keep their hands off our assets.
Lucas Bonné, Unsworth Heights.
On cannabis
Surely no one, with an interest in younger people and society as a whole, could possibly vote for legalising harmful, addictive, non-medical cannabis. This has to be one of the most important decisions of our time. Hylton Le Grice, Remuera.
On shootings
No wonder Jacinda says she doesn't understand America. They have another mass shooting in Texas and they ease restrictions on guns. Gloria McAneny, Mt Eden.
On metaphors
Luke Jacobson's exuberant original and fresh metaphor is undoubtedly a slip of the tongue but that happens when the subconscious takes over to pour out an emotion far beyond the mundane. "On top of the moon", that's fresh and cool. Malcolm Grover, Epsom.
On Amazon
This is a crime against humanity and Trump and Bolsonaro should be indicted in a just world. Steve Lincoln, Botany Downs.
On mayor
Let's vote SM for Mayor, Statutory Management. On any test, Auckland City is insolvent, CCO dysfunctional, and at or over its debt limit (if Capex blow outs are booked). Vote SM.
Tony Gavigan, St Marys Bay.
On insurance
If cover was restricted to 80 per cent of claimed loss, there would be fewer claims, less fraud and lower premiums. Kenneth Lees, Whangarei.
On fuel
In April, 2016, the Commerce Commission said "having analysed each market, the commission is satisfied that Chevron's departure from New Zealand would not substantially lessen competition". Now the commission is saying there isn't enough competition. Dave Parton, Bombay.
Warren Pay, jailed for murder, is now free after being re-sentenced for manslaughter.