One benefit of not being a chair this term of ARC is that I have had time between ARC meetings and workshops to take Masters in Planning Practice papers part-time at Auckland University. One paper I took in 2008 was Masters Infrastructure Planning. Its main assignment related to the strategic planning needed to support a Notice of Requirement (NOR) for the proposed Britomart Rail Tunnel project. The form of the assignment was a report to Ontrack.
Below I have pasted the Executive Summary of that assignment. If you are interested, I can send you the whole thing, plus appendicees. Remember - it is an assignment - but I wrote it as if it was objective and informed advice for Ontrack.
My key findings are set out in this Exec Summary.
Having done the research and analytical work needed for this assignment, I felt it would be useful to share my findings and recommendations with ARTA, and so provided a copy to a couple of ARTA Board Directors who tabled it at an ARTA Board meeting in October. At the time I wasn’t sure which organization (Ontrack or ARTA or both) would be carrying out the necessary NOR planning work.
I understand that at that meeting, the ARTA Board resolved to carry out a region wide network planning assessment. I also learned that Ontrack was to lead the NOR work, but in partnership with ARTA. I also provided a copy of the assignment to Ontrack staff who were working on Request for Tender (RFT) documentation in respect to the preparation of NOR documentation for the Britomart Rail Tunnel. You will recall that the previous Govt instructed Ontrack to protect that corridor – after the Downtown Westfield resource consent issue.
Just before Christmas Ontrack issued its RFT (request for tender) documentation. The due date for tenders is 5th Feb, $5 million has been set aside for the work, Ontrack is intending to lodge the completed NOR documentation with Auckland City Council within 12 months.....Executive Summary - Joel Cayford's Ontrack reportOntrack has been instructed by Government to protect and designate a preferred route for the Britomart Rail Tunnel in order to provide future passenger transport services. This report is a high level strategic analysis of work needed to support the related Notice of Requirement.
Electrification and expansion of Auckland’s suburban commuter rail network is now strongly supported at national, regional and local levels, both politically and in the transport and land use strategies set out in key planning documents.
Today, Britomart is the only railway station in the Auckland CBD. Its configuration constrains the Auckland rail network’s passenger carrying capacity. The Britomart Rail Tunnel project could release this constraint, and add one, two or three more stations, depending on which historical plan is considered. These plans were all prepared before the Auckland region decided to accept a Northern Rail connection to the North Shore through a harbour tunnel, as its preferred alignment and mode for the second harbour crossing.
The strategic planning issues this project poses are many and varied:
• A key objective for Ontrack is to increase rail freight, which in Auckland shares the network with commuter rail services. The implications of this conflict needs to be understood, and options for managing it considered to avoid rail freight services inhibiting the development of high capacity and high frequency passenger transport rail services.
• While the Britomart Rail Tunnel project has been around in some shape or form for almost 85 years, limited strategic planning for Auckland CBD Rail has been carried out recently that takes account of the provisions contained in Plan Change 6 to Auckland’s Regional Policy Statement, let alone a possible rail connection to the North Shore. ARTA (Auckland Regional Transport Authority), which now has the responsibility for planning Auckland’s passenger transport service network, has not conducted the necessary comprehensive strategic planning to support a NOR for the Britomart Rail Tunnel project.
• Auckland City Council will need to be involved in the planning for the size, location and functionality of railway stations within the CBD area, as well as bus/rail interchanges that might be required on the CBD periphery. ARTA, ARC and ACC will need to coordinate and sequence land use changes, the staging of transport infrastructure construction, and the roll out of new rail services – in order to optimise integration outcomes. There is a need to properly coordinate these planning processes in accordance with RLTS provisions, which suggest a duty to establish an appropriate "CBD Rail Steering Group" including ACC, ARC, ARTA and Ontrack.
This report explores these key issues, and asks several strategic questions, all of which need to be addressed thoroughly in an Integrated Transport Assessment process in accordance with RPS provisions, culminating in the development of a publicly agreed long term Auckland CBD rail network plan, before Ontrack can legitimately proceed to issue a Notice of Requirement for the Britomart Rail Tunnel project.
EndsI can provide copies of the RFT, if you are interested. The NZ Herald ran a story about this which you can read at:http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10551410
Just thought you should know that while I might worry from time to time about what the Royal Commission has in store for Auckland local government (and by the way, you can download an excellent summary of submissions document from their website by clicking this link), I have managed to find time to escape to Mangawhai and do a bit of hunter gathering.....
