Auckland Transport - It Should Be So Easy

I still don´t know where I´m going with this blog. I don´t know what I really want to say but I think that traveling opens you up to a whole range of opinions that you probably didn´t have before and you feel more like commenting on things at home when you see how other places are run. So this weeks topic/rant: public transport.

While I use public transport in Auckland a bit I understand like the rest of us Aucklanders that it is complete rubbish. It´s routes (especially from the shore) are long, slow and extremely overpriced. It never seems to run on schedule and the various companies seem to decide their fare structure and methods of payment at random, probably pulling them from a hat.

I was relieved to see this in the NZ Herald today
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10606862
and I´m happy with the decision to centralise the data gathering to a team that might actually make some changes. Like more buses from the north shore in the morning when every bus just drives past the last stops full of people. I know it´s profit that matters but it´s a fine line before putting people off entirely.

Some more ideas that need to be introduced to drastically reduce car usage in the city and (for all the hippies) make Auckland a greener place to be.

Get rid of roads: Auckland is far to car friendly, our main thoroughfare (Queen St) is a 4 lane highway that is surrounded by absolutely fine ring roads. So close queen st, high street and all the leading roads and make symonds st one way and albert st the other way therefore creating a one way flow system around the city... TRY IT for 6 months and then figure out if it´s working. When the council unceremoniously ripped up queen st to replace the cobbles they shut the street and sudenly it became a rather nice place to wander down and shop. So close Queen St, put coffee shops in the middle of it, stages for summer concerts and let people actally reclaim the city centre.

Bring Back Trams: Bordeaux, Barcelona, Frankfurt, Munich, Prague, Vienna, Budapest all have trams and Edinburgh´s getting one at the moment. They´re effecient, fast and a great way to get around central cities. Buses on queen st could easily be replaced by trams running up and down. Get daring and put them on K´Road, Ponsonby and down to Vic Park, creating a loop that locals could use, tourists would love and might get rid of cars in our inner city.

Better Price Brackets: While you´ll never please everyone, Auckland should be split in to Zones, like all major transport cities in the world. The zones radiate out from the centre depending on distance to travel but mean travel within zones is cheap and therefore worth while. There´s nothing worse than going from Northcote to Takapuna (10 minutes) and paying the same as a trip across the bridge. Of course people drive!

A new crossing (under the harbour): When Auckland had it´s major black out Mercury Energy ran a cable from outside Auckland to the centre to make sure it never happened again. The fear with underground cables is that the volcanic rock would be impassible. They drilled and quickly realised that once you get through the top crust, it´s soft underneath and they drilled very happily without incident. I know this because my dad worked on it.
It stands to reason that a tunnel under Auckland harbour isn´t a bad idea. This way we can reduce congestion on the feeding roads to the bridge and put in a high speed underground train that follows the route of the new bus lanes all the way in to the city centre.

There´s probably more and I´ll add to this if I get some more insight. My problem is that Auckland has always been crippled by its lack of foresight. We sit and live in this quagmire and don´t think anything can be done about it until we travel and realise what a mess we are putting up with.

As always... Abuse below