$10.7b will not stop traffic jams

Long-suffering Aucklanders cannot expect to reach work or school any faster after a $10.7 billion investment programme in public transport and roads, and restraints on travel demand.

The average speed on main roads and motorways will actually fall slightly, despite the massive 10-year funding boost, because of a projection of a 22 per cent increase in traffic levels.

But Auckland Regional Land Transport Committee chairman Joel Cayford said last night, after launching a strategy blueprint for public consultation, that a "do minimum" option would sink the country's main commercial centre further into the congestion quagmire.

Computer modelling indicates that keeping public transport at current levels, and spending only as much on roads as has already been committed, will lead to a reduction in average morning peak-period speeds from about 37.8km/h now to just 33.8km/h by 2016.

This compares with an average peak speed of 37.3km/h if $6.5 billion is spent on new and existing roads, and $3.75 billion is pumped into public transport.

Dr Cayford's committee, which has taken more than a year to oversee the preparation of a draft regional land transport strategy required by new legislation, has opted for an investment package which also includes $420 million for travel demand management.

This involves trying to modify transport behaviour by encouraging more people to walk, cycle or car-pool, and will involve an extension of travel planning among schools, community groups and businesses.

The spending option, chosen after heated political debate, is centred around what Dr Cayford describes as "aggressive" improvements in public transport while also completing 63 per cent of desired strategic roading network improvements.

But despite more than doubling what is now spent on public transport, the proportion of people using buses, trains or ferries will rise only by four percentage points - to 11.3 per cent of the 738,000 or so Aucklanders expected to travel in the morning peak by 2016. The proportion walking or cycling each morning will edge up by a modest 0.4 per cent, to 15.5 per cent, leaving 73 per cent still wedded to cars.

Planners expect 340,000 more people to be living in Auckland by then - equal to about the population of Christchurch - adding up to 195,000 cars to the region's existing fleet of about 640,000.

Dr Cayford's committee upset roading lobbyists in March by indicating that completion of a motorway link through Avondale as an extension of a western ring route to bypass Spaghetti Junction could not be afforded in such a package.

But he emphasised yesterday that the committee was prevented by law from nominating particular transport projects.

It remained up to Transit New Zealand to prioritise state highway projects and local bodies would in future have their applications for subsidies vetted by the Auckland Regional Transport Authority.

The authority, a new subsidiary of the Auckland Regional Council, would not sign off applications for regional or national funding unless these were in line with the new transport strategy.

Dr Cayford said that, although the latest strategy review was triggered by a Government requirement for Auckland's land-use and transport planning documents to curb urban sprawl, it was too short-term to deliver major changes. It would be followed by a more ambitious exercise, matching the 50-year horizon of the region's growth strategy and dealing with issues such as a second harbour crossing, an eastern transport corridor, and congestion-charging for the use of roads at peak times in the city.