Motorway planners' secrecy makes protesters suspicious

Protesters say the amount of tunnelling has shrunk with each redesign. Picture / Greg Bowker

Key design decisions on a $1 billion motorway extension through Mt Albert and Waterview on Auckland's western ring route have been delayed several months as community protests heat up.

Transit NZ says it now hopes to lodge a notice of requirement for a 5km motorway corridor by the end of September, representing a three-month delay, although community leaders suspect challenges facing the motorway designers will take even longer to deal with.

A political liaison group of Auckland City Council and community board members who meet monthly with council staff and Transit came under pressure yesterday from protesting residents demanding more information from behind closed doors.

Group members had to move to an upper floor of the council's administration building for a meeting after 10 to 12 residents occupied the foyer with placards demanding better accountability.

But Councillor Glenda Fryer, who is also one of nine representatives of three community boards on the liaison group, said last night that it had decided to publish full minutes of meetings once these became available and there was never any question of hiding proceedings.

Although the meetings are not held in public, she said that was normal for working parties preparing recommendations for councils, and Transit was not being spared tough questions on matters such as provision for adequate open space to compensate for motorway development.

"Absolutely not, they are having to examine more options and more issues than ever," Ms Fryer said.

She said it had been difficult to report much detail back to communities before now, as the initial meetings of the liaison group had focused on raising issues for Transit to work on.

These included the discovery of three archaeological sites, which Transit was having to work around, especially as the council had made mitigation measures a condition of its support for a motorway route through Waterview rather than Rosebank Peninsula.

Residents would also be able to make submissions once Transit lodged a notice of requirement for the motorway corridor, which she did not expect to happen until late this year.

Protest leader Bill McKay, of the Northwestern Community Association, complained in the council foyer that residents were being kept largely in the dark while the motorway design had undergone successive changes throughout the year.

He said the amount of tunnelling, rather than open motorway, appeared to have shrunk with each change, to the point that little more than 100m had been depicted in a draft alignment for the northern sector of the route sandwiched between Great North Rd and the prized Oakley Creek.

Long sections of open motorway are shown depicted on either side of that tunnel, including the site of a controversial interchange between Great North Rd and the Phyllis St Reserve, which the residents say is unnecessary if the motorway is to be part of a true ring route.

Mr McKay said the amount of traffic siphoned off Great North Rd would not be enough to compensate for the extra noise and fumes pouring from a largely open motorway, for which he believed there was inadequate room.

Transit acting regional manager Peter Spies denied the amount of potential tunnelling was shrinking, and said the agency was aware of the council's enhanced mitigation conditions.

But he acknowledged that difficult geological conditions, including a layer of basalt rock, were limiting opportunities for tunnelling.

Council roads manager Matthew Rednall pointed to a longer stretch of proposed tunnelling under both sides of New North Rd in Mt Albert, which would provide open space above.