Big slice of toll may go in admin: Transit NZ

More than half the money collected at some tolling points on Auckland's western ring route could be soaked up by administration costs, according to preliminary Transit NZ figures.

Transit northern regional manager Peter Spies disclosed yesterday that the cost of collecting tolls at each of seven camera-based charging points along the proposed 48km route between Manukau and Albany was expected be about 30c, plus or minus 10c.

That meant a cost of 20c to 40c each time a vehicle passed under a tolling gantry, he told the Auckland Regional Land Transport Committee. The gantries would cost $140 million to build.

Proposed peak-time tolls range from 75c in the northern part of the route to $1 at all other points except for the Onehunga foreshore, for which Transit is considering a tariff of $1.50.

The highways agency has just begun a seven-week consultation exercise, including a mailout to 470,000 Auckland homes to get support for tolls to cover a predicted $800 million funding gap in the ring route.

The Government has already committed $1.3 billion toward Transit's target of completing the route by 2015, but Transit said it would be impossible to finish the job before at least 2020 without charging tolls.

Transit is also considering off-peak tolls of 50c to $1, and a night tariff of 75c at just one point, Onehunga.

But it has reserved the right to raise tariffs by the rate of inflation, plus up to 2 per cent annually for at least 35 years.

Its board has given approval in principle to consider tolls of up to $2 at 2006 values at each charging point, or $10 for the entire route.

Transit wants to charge trucks about twice as much as cars. Buses would not be tolled, and Transit has said it has gone to great lengths to ensure motorists would have free alternative routes.

"Those of us who use public transport might pay $6 to $10 a day for that privilege. I guess tolling is pretty much the same - you pay for that," Mr Spies said.

He indicated transaction costs might be reduced by future "synergies" with other tolling projects.

Anti-toll lobby group Highway Robbery obtained Cabinet papers last year under the Official Information Act showing that Transit admitted in 2004 that $1.35 of every $1.80 it intended collecting on the tolled extension of the Northern Motorway to Puhoi would be eaten up by transaction costs.

But the Government instructed the agency to rework its figures before the motorway opening early in 2009.

Highway Robbery spokesman Hans Grueber circulated a letter to regional transport committee members before yesterday's meeting calling for extra roading funds to be raised from fuel taxes rather than a new "industry".

But Mr Spies said the amount being collected in petrol taxes was declining to the point that the Government was spending more money on roads than it was getting from motorists.