KEY POINTS:
Motorists face the prospect of more toll roads if National wins the next election, the party's transport spokesman said today.
Maurice Williamson said there was an urgent need to tackle traffic snarl-ups throughout the country and he raised the prospect of more tolling and more private sector involvement in major roading policies to fix the problem.
He said the perception that only Auckland was suffering gridlock was wrong and it was nationwide problem.
Mr Williamson told Newstalk ZB: "Sometimes in the mornings and in the evenings, if there is a truck crash or something falls off a van the whole place can come to a grinding halt."
He added: "It is interesting that a lot of people think it is just Auckland. It is not.
"Even in places like Nelson they are coming apart at the seams due to a lack of roading."
In February, the Government said it was pushing on with a study into charging Auckland motorists using key roads at peak times.
Although most Aucklanders also oppose the idea of "congestion charges", the Government said that the support indicated by 25 per cent of submissions to a consultation on the idea is "slightly higher" than for overseas schemes at such an early consultation stage.
However, plans to introduce a toll on Auckland's western ring route between Manukau and Albany were abandoned after a public revolt against the plan.
Just 20 per cent of more than 21,500 Aucklanders who returned questionnaires last year supported the scheme, which Transit said then was needed to plug an $800 million funding gap for the route to be completed by 2015.
Rodney District Council continues to favour a toll road to the Whangaparaoa Peninsula north of Auckland ahead of Transit NZ wrestling with setting up a national tolling umbrella both for its own projects and those of other road authorities.
Transit wants commonality between all tolling schemes to ensure motorists travelling between various parts of the country are not faced with a multitude of electronic collection systems, as happens in parts of Australia.
It also hopes to spread costs through economies of scale, by adding as many schemes as possible to its only toll project so far to gain Government approval, the $365 million motorway extension it is building through the hills between Orewa and Puhoi.
- NEWSTALK ZB, NZHERALD STAFF
