KEY POINTS:
Onehunga residents are rejoicing over a Government decision to resurrect their decaying branch railway under its $600 million basic upgrade of Auckland's rail network.
New railway stations may also be in store for Parnell and Khyber Pass Rd, giving passengers easier access to Auckland Domain and the hospital, as spinoffs from a $70 million redevelopment of Newmarket Junction.
Here is the latest selection of your views:
Chris Randal
Hayden has an interesting view of the relationships between the various parties - a view perpetuated by ARTA who have no interest in setting the record straight because then they would have to carry the blame.Veolia are contracted to run the train system, that is to provide the crews and run the operational side of the railway. The trains are owned by ARTA. The track is owned by Ontrack. The antiquated signalling system, which the owner has almost admitted is not fit for purpose, is owned and operated by Ontrack. All the decisions related to service levels, rolling stock and the provision thereof, timetables etc are made by ARTA, a council controlled organisation owned by the ARC. ARTA was created by the Local Government Auckland (Amendment Act) to stop the ARC mucking around with public transport as they were when the act was passed.
Rob
There is no doubt about it that I love our reopened railway it brings new hope for other closed lines around the country to be reopened. Well it seams that the buzz this year has been a stadium and public transport. With the new Northern Express and the western line double tracking we are well into expanding Auckland Public transport network so with the addition of the decision to re open Onehunga railway line and hopefully the decision to electrify the railway network. Waitakere Mayor Bob Harvey as well as double tracking the western line is planning to build a sunken railway through New Lynn. Plans to build a railway line to Manukau City are in place yet we are still haunted by the current West/ East and South line horror stories. If you ask any rail commuter they will have a story or two to tell about late trains, full trains, rude staff and of cause the incorrect signage or direction which leads to being on the wrong train.
What I thinks needs to happen rather than a series of proposals is that the Local Councils and Transport body need to team up with the council and put in place measure to improve the current railway network firstly by electrification (which should fix some of the issues that we face with signal failures), Adding on extra routes like Onehunga, Manukau and the Airport Link and finally by continuing to promote the railways and add additional trains to cope with demand.
Michael Nicholson
Fantastic news. Next step we need to send the line onto the airport! Auckland is really becoming a can do city!
Kathryn Arnold
Excellent news! I for one will certainly be using it on my daily commute to the city and back.All we need now is for the Auckland rail network to be electrified so that we can have fast reliable modern trains to go with it.
The Auckland rail network also needs to be further expanded to the Airport, Kumeu, Helensville, Manukau City, Botany, Hamilton and an underground line beneath the CBD from Britomart to Mt Eden and over to the North Shore. Then we could get all over Auckland and not have to use our cars!
Rosemary
In response to Tonys comment about the railway line being a waste of money - has he considered that it will also be used for freight? Freight trains will get trucks off the road, and trucks are the worst offenders for wrecking roads (costing millions to repair).
Bob McMurray (Germany)
I used to commute by train from Papatoetoe to Auckland University in the 1970s. The rail service has improved vastly since then but I would like to make a few suggestions for further improvement.
1: Electrify now. Not later. And that includes bringing back the trams. And then institute an electrified light rail commuter system.
2: Institute a Greater Auckland Transport Region (inner city and suburbs from North Auckland to the Bombays, subdivided into a myriad of zones) where you can travel the whole length and breadth of the Region using various forms of public transport on a single ticket. This is an effective method in Germany where I live. Parenthetically, from the town I live in here (near Heidelberg) I can hop on a train and travel to just over the French border for about $34 - and that's return.
3: Once you have a decent public transport system up and running, compulsorily seize all public parking buildings, compensate the owners sufficiently and ban all private parking in the Auckland inner city streets.
4: Construct more pedestrian zones in Auckland inner city.
Raj Subramanian
Previously I was resident of Onehunga. I know Bus Service to the City is not adequate in numbers. Railway is a good additional option. Such infrastructure schemes take quite a long time. Therefore first priority is introducing more number of buses on this route. Normally, transport operators say commuter nos are not enough. Commuters say waiting for 30 minutes for a bus is not worth it. Frequent services(every 10 minutes) will, in the long term prove to be popular and profitable. Short sighted thinking is denying us profitable Road Transport Services.
Vernon Wall
Town planners keep warbling on about persons wedded to their cars. We yes they are and for good reason. Cars are efficient. The biggest mistake and its easy to make, is to view data in isolation. Often quoted is the Hoary old assumption that, "a train travelling on near level steel tracks is more efficient than a bus or car". Well if you wanted to travel between Britomart and Otahuhu station at 5.oopm on Thursday night, that might be just about true. The train would make relatively few stops and be virtually full, thats about as efficient as you can get. If you want to travel between Barrys Point, Takapuna and Pakuranga Town centre (about the same distance and destinations only about 45 miles apart as the crow flies) travel by train would be hopelessly inefficient. This comes back to seeing efficiency as parts of travel in isolation. The year 2007 or 2020 no one is wanting to carry groceries home by the sack on a train. The fact is train travel is extremely limited to narrow corridors of convenience. It may suit the high rise residences of Parnell and newly created high density slums of Panmure, but for the majority of urban dwellers rail does not fit. When you compare the versatility of bus travel to train bus wins out every time, because it can use various coach sizes to match demand, it can vary routes to meet demand. The advent of shuttle buses with point to point pick up and drop off, fully compliments public travel. Much criticism is made of the single traveller car. To compare a train journey with a very low loading is equally inefficient, the 1000 tonne train unit withis 1000horsepower diesel, whilst being as efficient as it can be for its size, cannot compete with several efficient cars each with one person equalling the number of passengers on a lightly loaded train. when the component of taxis are added to make up the access to and delivery from the train location, the failings of the train argument completely fall apart.
This is in smaller scale exactly what the haulage industry found some several years ago, now only bulk freight (equivilent to full passenger loadings) can be made effective by rail, all other freight is transported by road where point to point total efficiency is achieved. Why is passenger freight different? Busses are far more effective; excepting the Central govt theft of fuel taxes to prop up general expenses has lead to a false rundown of the roading system. its the roading system at fault not the bus system. Our bus system is faulted in different ways, mainly by funding and utilisation constraints brought about by traditional cost models and union requirements. Example we use bigger busses which are more expensive to purchase and run and put greater impact on our roads because we make a savings in staf costs, yet we pay dole to unemployed who could make up additional driver numbers. Bigger busses are more difficult to negotiate on the roads and harder to manage in terms of balancing operating cost to demands.
Similarly our rail system is blighted, we are unable to operate smaller and more frequent rigs, we are unable to effect changes at short notice, we use old technology designs in our terminus so that train journeys finish on a platform miles from anywhere. Nowhere in Auckland does a train journey finish inside a shopping mall or a large carpark. 200 years of experience and we let our planners and politicians dump on us colonial thinking, a job half done and less than useless.
Why then electrification? Given that peak commuter travel demand coincides very closely with peak electricity demand when carbon fuel generation is called in to make up demand, any further increase in demand is going to be a direct increase in carbon fuel supplement supply. Given the high loss rate of electric power being transported and delivered to the user site, electrification promises only marginal advantages at best, mostly it offers net carbon cost disadvantages. Why then electrification, at billions of cost only to produce a loss or marginal carbon benefits. One of the things that keeps prices in perspective is competition. NZ is enjoying a period where cars have never been cheaper because completion has brought about oversupply leading to price-cutting. With one train line how will supply competition effect price control in rail. The fact is it wont. rail is a cost plus mentality, further more nearly all modern rail is outsourced overseas from specialist manufacturers, they also through design rights have a cost plus mentality, pushing service maintenance costs way out of the efficiency bracket. No one speaks of these near monopoly pricing regimes when quoting rail as efficient, but Gary Taylor knows full well that commitment to a type of train specification is a licence to charge the public for a long cycle, every maintenance, ever refurbishment will incur a cost, in the end it may well be a cost greater than the original.
It comes back to trains being more of a Leninist ideology of centralist control rather than a 21st century solution. What say you, will you still support trains. My friend Rob of Howick, has a Volkswagen Golf, he has made a point of tuning and maintaining his five year old petrol 1.6 litre car, he often goes to Tauranga, he averages 55 miles per imp gallon around city and over 60 miles per imp gallon on his Tauranga trips. It is hard to better the performance of; timetable convenience, door to door convenience, 5 seat convenience, reasonable safety both vehicle and personal, instant availability, and 55 miles per imp gallon of 91 fuel.He can change route as required to anywhere, No train service can do it, electrified or otherwise.
Lyle Lanley
I think a monorail is a great idea. Look at the success it brought North Haverbrook. If we all break into song and chant "monorail, monorail" rhythmically maybe we can have a monorail too.
Dennis
Fantastic news and a definate step in the right direction can not imagine why this decision wasnt made years ago. Thanks to all concerned.
SB
Progress at last!! That is an excellent proposal. I especially like the idea of having a stop in Parnell and a "gateway" to the museum.....we need more tourist friendly initiatives. At the moment it is absolutely impossible to get around and see the best of Auckland without a car, that to me is ridiculous, so am very happy to hear measures are going to be put into place for that purpose, and also fixing up the train lines. However, sometime in the near future I would really like to see a train station at Manukau City. Manukau has the largest growing population in Auckland and there is not even a train that goes through! Same goes for Botany. And a train to the North shore would also be nice.
Hayden
About time.. only another 15 or so years before we get agreement to get rail out to Auckland Airport. However, with Veolia running the show, Aucklands rail network doesnt have a hope in hell of even scratching the surface of becoming "world class" . Brisbane brought back its rail network, rebuffed Veolia after its disastrous foray into French rail, and now has an electrified rail network to be proud of. Auckland could do the same. It just takes one politician to grow a pair, and the common wo/man to stand up and get the rail transport provice back into public ownership. Only then will electrification happen.
Tony
What an unbelievable waste of money ! Costs: the story outlines capital costs of $15 million for track and station. They talk about a half hour service and, given a half-hour journey time each way, this means buying at least 3 trains. Even assuming each train has only one DMU, at $3million each (or equivalent) thats another $9 million even before spares. So even now we are looking at the thick end of $30 million excluding finance (if you borrow the money) and operating subsidy (yes it will require major ongoing subsidy like the rest of rail). The overall costs could easily be twice this amount (going by Wellington Rail costs).
Benefits: The report on the Onehunga Line from rail supporters www.getmoving.org.nz includes the statement "Patronage projections prepared by the Regional Council to assist with this investigation indicate that during the 2-hour morning peak period in 2011, a half hourly service from Onehunga would generate a total of an additional 300 rail passengers. Of these 57 per cent would use the Onehunga and Te Papapa Stations. Over half the rail passengers (162) switch from local bus services. A total of 58 people are diverted from cars. Lets do the math: $30 million / 300 people = $100,000 per person to give them a seat on the train
Francis
I am very glad to hear about the Onehunga rail decision.Two thoughts: first, while there are plenty of things we would like to see happen sooner rather than later (electrification and integrated tickets being at the top of my list), it is worth noting that some really positive things have happened in relation to public transport in Auckland over the last few months, and I hope Brian Rudman and other pro-public transport commentators are willing to say "well done" in regards to this decision. My second thought was this: one of the best urban walks in the world is Auckland's Coast to Coast walkway, which starts in downtown Auckland and finishes in Onehunga. Wouldnt it be great if, to coincide with the re-opening of the Onehunga line to passenger rail, the Auckland City Council could print a brochure entitled "Coast to Coast walkway - walk one way, and take the train back". It could have the walks route and a rail timetable, so that tourists and Aucklanders can make use of this new public transport resource for pleasure as well as for commuting purposes.
Eurokiwi
Excellent news to hear this, hopefully the stepping stone to an Auckland airport rail link.
Rosemary
It is fantastic that the government will reopen the Onehunga train line!
As the NZ Herald story mentions, I will now be able to get to the city in 20 mins instead of sitting on a bus sometimes for over an hour. This is great news and shows that the government is putting its money where its mouth is on the environment (even though I still believe $10m is peanuts compared to what they spend on roads).
Maxine Hemi
Take out the roads and get fit!
Mike
Great news the disused line is to reopen, meaning the Government and Auckland Regional Couoncil is taking public transport seriously.I do not think the reopening of the line goes far enough: Does Central Government or the ARC have any further plans to extend the Onehunga line to the Auckland International Airport? Most visitors to Auckland will travel into the CBD for their accommodation and a one hour trip in a taxi or bus in rush hour is disgraceful, not to mention the cost of a taxi fare. A train from the airport into the CBD makes sense, especially since most of the infrastructure is already in place.
Isaac Broome
The solution to solving Aucklands transport problems is to invest in the rail system. Trains have their own dedicated corridors and do not have to compete with all the other traffic. Trains can carry considerably more people, more quickly than any other mode of transport. And rail is the most environmentally friendly form of land transport. The current system needs to be electrified, along with new electric trains, have new modern signalling installed, and the network needs to be expanded. This all needs to be completed by 2011 so that New Zealand doesnt face international embarrassment with the looming transport nightmare that will occur while the Rugby World Cup is hosted in Auckland. The Onehunga Branch line needed to be reopened, initially to Onehunga ASAP, with latter extensions to Avondale and a loop line to Manukau running via the Airport.Train services need to be extended also to Helensville to the north and to Hamilton to the south.Intercity train services need to be reintroduced between Auckland and Rotorua, and Auckland and Tauranga/ Mt Maunganui.
Helena Hooper
As an alternative futuristic option, I thought I would suggest a monorail (on a large extent - for a geographically large city). Clean, modern transport, and if you elevate it - it still enables future planning for roading systems. I dont catch a train because they dont seem very clean, they aren't anywhere near my house in Howick, and if I have to drive to a train station in Mt Wellington, park, wait, get on a train I may as well just keep driving. The main advantage of monorail is that the only stop the system will make is for boarding and off loading - no street lights, traffic jams, accidents for the public transport system to cater too. If i knew my public transport was going to get me somewhere - on time, without fail I would catch it, but I have given up on ferries and buses.
Michelle
Aucklands public transport has got to be fixed! Forget about what it costs... the same debate went on in about the 30s;noone wanted to pay for it then, which is why we have still got a problem! Bring back trams in the city, too.
Pamela Moresby
I believe that the Auckland City council has gone on the right track to put more motorways etc. However, it is also possible to increase public transport and not only buses. Provide train tracks alongside the new motorway extension going from Onehunga and along Hillsborough_ to Pt Chevalier. There is a Historical railway hall and enthusiasts in Onehunga and this can be used for tourism as well. Put in a Ferry Service with a flat bottomed boat from Waiuku to Onehunga and even extend that to other ports in the Manukau Harbour. Even if it is just operated by sails it will also boost the tourist industry.Put in a ring route around Auckland to gain transport cross country not just buses in and out of the central city. There are many ways you could use the transport system to pay for itself in tourism as well, as Auckland is close to many scenic waterways or even place transport -historic routes along the traditional portage roads. Also put a few more biking lanes in exclusively for push bikes.
Jody Lane
I catch the bus everyday to and from work (Grey Lynn to Penrose). As I sit in traffic in look at how many people are occupying the vehicles. Mostly just one person. Shocking really. Has any one ever considered Car Pooling with there neighbours or co-workers. If only 10 per cent of Auckland did this, think about the difference it would make. Imagine 20 per cent. It won't solve the problem but people need to be more pro-active when it come to solutions instead of whinging for someone else to fix it.
