Editorial: New Auckland Transport Alignment Project plan: Just do it already

Opinion

Summertime and the living is easy, right? Not if you live in Auckland and you're trying to get to the beach, to work, home again, to an event, social engagement, to the doctor, the hospital, the airport, the shops, or even out of the city for a long weekend to escape the madness.

At any time of the year, hours each day can be wasted sitting in long lines of traffic, going nowhere fast.

Long-suffering Aucklanders have learnt to be creative: getting up earlier and staying at work later to beat rush-hour traffic; conducting business from home, behind the wheel or in the passenger seat; having coffee, breakfast, lunch or tea to go; carrying out personal grooming on the morning commute.

Some of us suffer in silence, some rage, and some make risky or illegal manoeuvres to beat the endless queue blues.

Aucklanders are sick of living with the city's traffic woes. The rest of the country is tired of hearing about Auckland's traffic woes.

Businesses are fed up calculating the cost of lost productivity when the city grinds to a halt, tourists must think we are third world, and all we ever seem to hear is how previous governments and councils are at fault for under-planning, under-investing, under-delivering.

The Government and Auckland Council's $28 billion transport programme for the super city - unveiled yesterday - aims to dramatically change all the above.

Transport Minister Phil Twyford and Auckland Mayor Phil Goff are describing the new Auckland Transport Alignment Project (or ATAP) as "transformative'', "'visionary'', a "game changer'' and "the biggest infrastructure programme in New Zealand's history".

Heady promises, indeed.

The package is the new Coalition Government's take on the ATAP first adopted by the National-led government and the council under then-mayor Len Brown.

The strength of the ATAP is the acknowledgement transport planning for our biggest city cannot be an ad-hoc process or political football, but must involve a co-ordinated approach between central and local government.

Of course there is still room for political point-scoring. Twyford says the new plan is fully costed (unlike the almost $6 billion worth of projects envisaged but not funded in the previous plan). It also includes two of National's favoured projects - Penlink and Mill Rd - not previously indicated to be on Labour's agenda.

On paper, the plan is comprehensive, combining walkways, cycleways, road safety improvements and better bus links, plus light and heavy rail. It acknowledges essential synergies with housing infrastructure and urban growth planning, and spreads the funding load, putting a fuel tax, private finance and tolls in the mix.

Critics will complain some charges are unfair (National calls the Penlink proposal a "triple whammy" for motorists), worry about public-private partnerships, fear regional roading wishlists will pay the price for such a big investment in the super city, and congestion-wary Auckland commuters may simply think they've heard all the promises before.

The country's growth and productivity cannot continue to be held to ransom courtesy of gridlock in our biggest city. If the numbers stack up, let's get on with it and let our new leaders turn their bold new vision into reality. And make it sooner than later, please.