Let us toll existing city roads say mayors

Mayors of three Auckland cities want the Government to give them power to toll motorists on existing roads to bridge an ever-widening transport funding gap.

They have resolved - but not without dissent - to send Auckland City Mayor Dick Hubbard to Wellington to press their case with Government ministers.

Regional officials warn of a potential shortfall of up to $2.3 billion in a 10-year, $11 billion transport plan.

Mr Hubbard has strong backing from his Waitakere and Manukau counterparts, although North Shore Mayor George Wood believes the Government should not be allowed off the hook in taking the lead in introducing road tolls.

Mr Wood was the only dissenting voice at a meeting last month of the Auckland Mayoral Forum, which is calling for a right to charge for driving on existing roads.

This goes further than Government policy for tolls on new roads.

But Auckland Regional Council chairman Mike Lee, who was not at that meeting, says Aucklanders pay enough for new roads and other transport needs through taxes and should not have to carry an extra burden of tolls and costly infrastructure needed to collect them.

The forum argues that tolling existing roads would let Auckland "take more responsibility for raising the funding needed to provide for the transport requirements of the region".

Mr Hubbard said yesterday that the need for extra money had become more urgent with Transit New Zealand saying there was not enough to build a tunnel under Victoria Park to unblock one of the country's worst motorway bottlenecks.

Transit bowed to local pressure late in 2004 by agreeing to dig a one-way northbound tunnel rather than a visually intrusive replacement viaduct over the park, after resisting a two-way tunnel as unaffordable.

Even after costing the project, Transit offered last year to make an accelerated start in 2008, and has been drilling under Victoria Park to test ground stability.

The region remains united in wanting a tunnel rather than another viaduct, which Mr Hubbard said had no place in the heart of a modern city with a growing need for more open space to match an influx of new residents.

"For the sake of future generations of Aucklanders, the only solution can be a tunnel," he said.

He believed the 600m tunnel would be too short to toll by itself, and said he would prefer wider collection nets such as "cordons" around key areas where motorists could be offered viable public transport alternatives.

Transit leaders could not be reached for comment, but have disclosed a need to borrow $800 million to supplement an expected $3.2 billion of Government grants for new Auckland highways, including missing links in the 35km western ring route from Manukau to Albany.

It is considering whether to toll parts or all of the route.

But the mayoral forum says collecting tolls for a national road-building account will not directly help Auckland to plug public transport funding gaps.

Mr Wood said he was not opposed to a fair scheme, but had resisted a move by Transit to toll the Upper Waitemata Harbour stretch of the ring route, used by many commuters between North Shore and Waitakere.

Mr Hubbard raised a "hypothetical" possibility of tolling the existing stretch of State Highway One through central Auckland, to encourage drivers to use the western alternative, and pointed to a recent introduction of parking surcharges in Melbourne.

Waitakere Mayor Bob Harvey said he fully supported Mr Hubbard's mission, even if it left him and other Auckland leaders exposed to political heat which would otherwise fall on the Government in introducing tolls.

"It is time for Auckland to form a pact of unity - commonsense and unity. The Government is not going to tolerate divided voices," he said.

But Mr Lee said Auckland was entitled to more Government money as "payback" for years of transport under-funding rather than spending a fortune on toll computer systems.


Clipping the ticket

* Tolls could speed up construction of a tunnel under Victoria Park, the central city's worst bottleneck.
* The latest cost of the one-way northbound tunnel is $370 million.