September 15, 2005 1:58pm by David Farrar

Auckland Roads

Maurice Williamson has usefully pointed out that on the 8th of August Jeanette Fitzsimons said:

If the Greens are in Government after the election we

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Spam

Is this the same motorway that Labour stalled for 5 years, only to start it at an ‘electorally-optimum’ time where they took the opportunity to grab a couple of good publicity shots?

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September 15, 2005 2:16pm

tim barclay

This issue needs to be sent to every letterbox in Auckland and it will drive down Labour’s vote in Auckland more than anything else. Maurice has a great story to tell in Auckland on this and a great presentation. Motorway gridlock in Auckland is very real and is a major for everyone who uses the system.

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September 15, 2005 2:21pm

Ian Peter Daly

“in favour of developing a state-of-the-art electric rail system”
Seems like a good forward thinking idea to me
I lived in London Pre and Post M25

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September 15, 2005 2:29pm

frog

David: The Greens have made quite clear that we aren’t going into negotiations with non-negotiable bottom lines. If the word “insist” implies that this is such a bottom line, then we shouldn’t have used the word “insist”.

But, while we’re on this topic, perhaps you can answer my question for me: given that $550 million a year of petrol tax is currently spent on public transport projects, and given that National has pledged that all petrol tax will be spent on roads, where will this $550 million be found from? Will all government funding for public transport cease, or will it be found from other areas of government expenditure?

Added to your bulk funding policy, and your law and order policy, you have an awful lot of money to find…

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September 15, 2005 2:30pm

Nick

Frog – you’re a @#$%ing twit. The word insists to most people means EXACTLY what means. You can’t arbitrarily redefine the English language to support your lack of fundamental common sense and intellect.

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September 15, 2005 2:41pm

frog

Nick: I love you too 🙂 I just said that if insists implies a bottom line, then we shouldn’t have used that word…

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September 15, 2005 2:48pm

darren

David, I hope your point is made on some billboards alongside the SH1 motorway in Auckland.

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September 15, 2005 2:49pm

tim barclay

I like the way Frog goes all wobbly when that word insist means lost votes for Labour in Auckland. I still like that TVOne news item that had Fitzsimons praising walking with Helen Clark and then promptly got into the LTD Limo and sped off to her next appointment.

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September 15, 2005 2:52pm

S Heath

Frog, any other words, promises, etc from the Green co-leaders you want to change now?

Or was it just poor choice of words and we should expect that the Green co leaders do not think before they speak?

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September 15, 2005 2:54pm

frog

Substitute “argue strongly for” in the place of “insist on” and you’ll get the picture..

Anyway, I’ll still waiting to hear from one of you on where that $550 million is coming from?

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September 15, 2005 3:01pm

darren

From the money Cullen-ochio was to spend on interest-free student loans 🙂

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September 15, 2005 3:09pm

baxter

I think work on the motorway has already started I saw an item on Labour TV. It could take a while as the only person working on it was a witch wearing a red blazer and she was using a spade.

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September 15, 2005 3:19pm

Insolent Prick

No, Frog. The Greens, and you, are being totally dishonest about this. Labour and the Greens have deliberately attempted to avoid discussion of the policy implications of a Labour-Green agenda. If the Greens get their way, there will be no new highways built.

You can’t say it any other way, as much as you try to spin it.

The Green’s policy agenda is an extreme prescription that the vast majority of New Zealanders would be very alarmed to have here. New Zealand parents do not want Nandor as Associate Education Minister, pushing drugs on young New Zealanders. They do not want Sue Bradford as Social Welfare Minister. They do not want Jeanette Fitzsimons–anti-energy, and anti-transport–overseeing electricity generation and roading projects, given her extreme bias against both.

That is the kind of absurd agenda that the Greens will try and place on New Zealand. Labour has nowhere else to run; United Future will not work in coalition with the Green Party at the cabinet table.

A vote for Labour is a vote for an extremist policy framework dictated by the Greens. No amount of wishy-washy, mealy-mouthed spin from you, Frog, can change that.

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September 15, 2005 3:20pm

dim

The Greens are now running up and down the road outside my office in a motorised steam train. Cute, but if they’re still doing it in five minutes it’ll be annoying.

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September 15, 2005 3:28pm

Russell Brown

Now, this *is* the same Maurice Williamson who declared some weeks ago that the proposed Eastern motorway should absolutely be considered a state highway and funded by government, then more recently (when said motorway somehow went missing from National’s policy) said it should absolutely *not* be considered a state highway and was purely a local issue?

Frankly, I don’t think the Greens in government would be able to get in the way of SH20, but don’t make the mistake of thinking that Aucklanders will necessarily lap up new road building at the expense of public transport. It’s not so long since a certain mayor *lost* an election on the promise of building a new motorway, and handed Auckland its first centre-left council in years.

Cheers,
RB

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September 15, 2005 3:30pm

frog

Glad you brought up energy, IP 🙂

I suggest you go read this article by David Haywood, an energy engineer: http://www.publicaddress.net/default,2538.sm#post

After giving the Greens the best rating of all the parties (4.5 stars), he went on to write:
“Why are the parties of the right so adverse to common sense energy policy? In a recent television debate Peter ‘Common Sense’ Dunne asserted that the problem with the Green Party was that they’d have us all taking cold showers. Actually, I remember the electricity shortages of the early 90s, a winter of cold (or at least lukewarm) showers for most of us. A winter where, of course, the only people who had hot showers were those with solar water heaters. So ironically – from an energy engineer’s perspective – the Greens’ policy is just the opposite of cold showers. And the policies of United Future (and some of the other parties of the right) are just the opposite of common sense.”

Which part of Haywood’s analysis do you disagree with…

Anti-energy and anti-transport? Please.

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September 15, 2005 3:33pm

frog

Thanks for bring up energy, IP. Have you read this article: http://www.publicaddress.net/default,2538.sm#post

If you haven’t, it’s an analysis of all the parties’ energy policies. By energy engineer David Haywood, it gives the Greens top marks – 4.5 stars – and National and Act bottom marks – one and zero stars respectively. It concludes:
“Why are the parties of the right so adverse to common sense energy policy? In a recent television debate Peter ‘Common Sense’ Dunne asserted that the problem with the Green Party was that they’d have us all taking cold showers. Actually, I remember the electricity shortages of the early 90s, a winter of cold (or at least lukewarm) showers for most of us. A winter where, of course, the only people who had hot showers were those with solar water heaters. So ironically – from an energy engineer’s perspective – the Greens’ policy is just the opposite of cold showers. And the policies of United Future (and some of the other parties of the right) are just the opposite of common sense.”

What part of Haywood’s analysis do you disagree with? By the way, he has this to say on the Greens:
“The Green’s energy policy is by far the most detailed, comprehensive, and well-considered of any political party. Congratulations to whoever wrote it.”

So, calling Jeanette anti-energy? Give me a break.

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September 15, 2005 3:41pm

frog

Sorry, my almost identical messages are due to DPF’s frightfully slow comment system, which had convinced me that the first one didn’t work…

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September 15, 2005 3:46pm

S Heath

So, RB, instead of commenting of the Greens you seem to be attacking the messanger?

Nice way to avoid the issue of the post…

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September 15, 2005 3:47pm

Insolent Prick

Frog,

Socialist propaganda, written by socialist “commentators”, does not constitute credible evidence.

Put it this way. If I went to your stupid blog, made a ridiculous and inaccurate claim, and used something that David Farrar had said as evidence supporting my claim, you would not be convinced, either.

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September 15, 2005 3:57pm

Aucklander

S Heath: read the post.

As an Aucklander I want to see a real public transport system here. Sooner rather than later.

And thinking that people want roads everywhere helped send Banksie down the road.

Maybe it needs the greens pushing to get serious about this.

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September 15, 2005 4:03pm

Lucyna

The Frog Blog seems to be down at the moment. Is is broken, overloaded, or have I been banned? If it’s overloaded, you frogs don’t seem to have accounted for capacity there.

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September 15, 2005 4:07pm

Nick

No, it is working even if you can’t access it. Frog has redefined the English language to suit what he thinks he means.

Btw, I just voted. The lackey behind the counter wanted to know why I wanted to vote today instead of tomorrow. I told him I had more important things to do on Saturday, which offended him. He asked what, so I told him I was going sailing. That seemed to offend him even more.

Interestingly enough, just as I was driving out, I met our esteemed candidate for Northcote. He’s actually quite a nice chap.

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September 15, 2005 4:15pm

frog

Frogblog has crashed. We’re trying to work out whether it’s simply overloaded, or has been hacked… Hopefully we’ll have it back up soon.

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September 15, 2005 4:20pm

Sean

Frog – to answer your question about where the money will come from: It is conter-intuitive, but nontheless true, that government revenues will increase when tax rates are reduced. In short, the money will come from a bigger economy.

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September 15, 2005 4:21pm

spam

The greens appear to have made another “bottom line”: A minimum of two cabinet portfolios:

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3411710a11,00.html

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September 15, 2005 4:29pm

Winston Smith

Why the hell when it comes to transport in this country is it always a toss up between two options, surely we can complete the vital second route through Auckland at the same time as fixing the public transport system. And also as a self confessed train nutter myself , why the f**k do Politicians both national and local think trains are a good idea for Auckland ??? The city is far too thinly spread for a comprehensive train network. It would require train lines all over the place to get good coverage because of Auckland’s geography (exhibit a: Sydney) which means very very high track maintenance costs (exhibit b: Sydney) without the ridership to pay for that maintenance (exhibit c: Sydney/4 = Auckland). Why not build busways all over the place like Auckland’s North Shore has the intelligence too (exhibit d: Brisbane).

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September 15, 2005 4:36pm

Sean

Frog – to answer your question about where the money will come from: It is conter-intuitive, but nontheless true, that government revenues will increase when tax rates are reduced. In short, the money will come from a bigger economy.

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September 15, 2005 4:40pm

docent

Good to see the Ruling class have adopted their usual haughty mein now the election is close, havent you Nick.

But of course the person he voted for is a ‘nice chap’,the things you can tell from a handshake.
The numbers of upper class twits out sailing on a saturday, makes one wish for a tempest, and having looked at my metvuw.com weather charts, in this wish, I may be satisfied

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September 15, 2005 4:46pm

fred smith

Check out
http://www.trademe.co.nz/Antiques-collectables/Postcards-writing/Pens/auction-35384368.htm

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September 15, 2005 4:54pm

Russell Brown

IP, Haywood is an *energy engineer*, and quite an accomplished one. He knows what he’s talking about, and he writes beautifully. I know that anyone who expresses a view that does not square with your rigid worldview is ergo a socialist idiot, but try actually reading that post.

Cheers,
RB

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September 15, 2005 4:59pm

Spam

RB:

I’m an “Energy Engineer” as well – and I skipped through it briefly (I’ll digest it more thoroughly later).

But one point that I noticed:
He suggests that looking for more Oil & Gas is akin to winning lotto. The *fact* (and yes, I say *fact*) is that there is more oil and gas to be found and developed. How can I be so sure?

Because the gas price in NZ has been so low that it has simply not been worth looking for, and in places where gas has been found, its been considered uneconomic to extract. Better technology (eg fracturing reservoirs & horizontal drilling) combined with higher prices mean that there is suddenly an incentive to actually go looking again – hence why (I believe) there have been more exploration permits awarded lately than for a long time.

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September 15, 2005 5:15pm

Insolent Prick

Russell,

I have no idea who you are, although somebody some time back did mention that somebody with a name similar to yours was making a few pompous and toffee assertions about my blog. It may have been you; I wasn’t really paying attention.

Haywood is a socialist moron. By endorsing him, he is a socialist moron, as well. Anybody who claims that the Green’s energy policy–which is in essence to shut down all development of new generation–is a fringe cocksucker.

Fortunately, the public don’t share your pinko commie view of the world, Russell. New Zealanders don’t want a Labour government that is heavily pressured by the Greens to raise the costs of petrol in their cars. They don’t want a Labour/Greens coalition that puts public transport that nobody uses ahead of Auckland’s major roading needs.

The Left have defied all the odds, and lost the agenda. They have run an appalling campaign. They have lied, cheated, and smarmed their way out of office.

Good riddance.

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September 15, 2005 5:17pm

TomV

WHy is that any Green presence in government will involve inplimentatuion of all their ideas, yet their is no concern over National having to impliment all UFs ideas. Dunne has stated he is oppose dto abolishing Maori seats, he’ll “insist” on keeping his wasteful and pointless families commission, and heacven forbid we find out what Winston will demand.

So, why are Labour support parties a concern, but Nationals aren’t. At least pretend some consistency.

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September 15, 2005 5:42pm

Insolent Prick

Quite simple, Tom.

The Green Party agenda is far more extremist than the Labour Party one. In many ways, the Greens are simply a means of Labour outsourcing its most radical freaks: they end up in the Greens. The Greens pull Labour towards more extreme positions; Labour will have nowhere else to go in the next Parliament, other than further to the Left.

On the other hand, on the Right, National has swallowed Act. Act won’t be around. The external forces influencing National’s coalition are to the centre of National–moderating it.

A National-UF coalition doesn’t scare New Zealanders. Most centre voters are very comfortable with Peter Dunne and his sensible and pragmatic approach. Many centre voters are downright frightened by the Greens, and rightfully so.

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September 15, 2005 5:56pm

S Heath

Re: Aucklander at September 15, 2005 04:03 PM

Excuse me, I was referring to RB talking about the writer of the press release and not the CONTENT of the release. Thus trying to change the subject…

As you are from Auckland I will forgive your lack of ability to understand simple concepts.

Hugs and kisses

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September 15, 2005 8:14pm

Libertyscott

The frog comment about $550 million a year being spent on public transport projects is utter nonsense. Land Transport NZ National Land Transport Programme 2005/06 states $240 million of road users money used to pay for NON road users (passenger transport).

The Green view on transport is at best childish and naive (ohhhh wouldn’t it be SOOO good if all the nasty motorists all stood around and walked to a railway station and shared their transport like good little collectives do, shame they have to leave when they are told, travel where they are told, and have very little flexibility) OR simply fascist and nonsensical. ALL of their transport solutions involve road users paying for empty alternatives, trains which pay around a third of their operating costs are “efficient”, cars which help fund social welfare through petrol tax are not.

The Greens think the car is bad – because they cannot stand individuals travelling where and when they want to – if they DIDN’T think that, they would support cars shifting to cleaner energy like fuel cells – but they always push collectivised transport. Rod Donald goes on about the Southerner, which carried 45 people a day! A big old dirty diesel locomotive pulling 3 wagons for a busload.

Nostalgic luddites.

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September 15, 2005 9:47pm

anon

LibertyScott: So you’re against people having choice? You think they should suffer in traffic jams- despite the fact that 87% of Aucklanders want a better PT system? Who is the fascist here, biyatch.

I guess you’ve never been to a real city like London, Paris, New York or even Melbourne which has a decent public transport system.

It makes life easier for both public transport users (more frequent services, cheap to get to work and back) AND road users, due to less traffic, more parking spaces and more options.

Auckland already has most of the rails: a few more lines, perhaps even some light rail systems would solve most of the worries, make the city flow freely and save $1B a year in delays.

Nationals roading projects will do nothing in the long run to solve traffic problems.

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September 15, 2005 10:42pm

alistair

SH20 will undoubtedly get done, because it’s fundamentally a really dumb idea to funnel a huge amount of through traffic through the CBD. Outside of this, any new highway in the Auckland region is one too many. Look at the suburban sprawl that coincided with the extension of the motorway to Orewa. Foolish people, watch your commute time shoot up as the motorway saturates, watch your petrol bill rocket. New housing should be primarily high-density around existing rail infrastructure. “Market forces” might take care of this in the long run, but urban planning’s not inherently a bad idea.

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September 15, 2005 11:32pm

Graham watson

RB,

Why do you not permit people to take you to task on your views by allowing comment on your alleged blog, yet you engage in the practise you censor on real blogs?

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September 15, 2005 11:45pm

RAS

Excellent question Graham. I’ve noticed the same lack of a comments function on RB’s “Hard News” as well. I suppose it’s because he considers himself an old-media “journalist” and therefore not subject to feedback or criticism.

His site is a pulpit, not a blog.

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September 16, 2005 12:52am

Insolent Prick

I suppose the answer is, Graham, that for once in his life, when creating his blog, Russell actually had an intelligent insight: that by the time a reader had finished reading his pinko propaganda, the reader will have fallen asleep, and be unable to make a comment.

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September 16, 2005 9:38am

darren

Typical socialist thinking from Alistair.
He wants us all living in high-rise little boxes.
I currently do, as it’s all i can afford , despite a comfortable middle-income wage.
Why can’t the traditional house with garden be affordable to New Zealanders any more?
It’s not like we are overpopulated like the UK (where I am from) or other European countries.
There is heaps of land. Get to the Bombay Hills and there is nothing significant until you get to Hamilton.
Imagine how a new town of say 250,000 would take the pressure away from congested Auckland, congestion which will only worsen as its population heads towards 2 million, as forecast.
Property prices are high because socialist bureaucrats are restricting the supply of land.
If land is expensive, ergo, so are house prices.
Simple cost-plus economics.
But socialists want to control our lives. They want us all in little boxes, where parking spaces are either not provided or are unaffordable.
That is the only way they can make their beloved public transport economic.
And if people feel they have to rely on the state for transport, they might feel the state is needed for other things. That is how socilaists think.
This is a clear election on how New Zealand determines its future. It is a vote for freedom-loving parties like ACT or National, or for statists in the Greens and Labour who want to poke their noses into the nooks and crannies of everyday life.

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September 16, 2005 10:15am