Auckland Congestion Charge - Proposal by a political party

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#3143647 6-Oct-2023 15:55

Senecio:

I genuinely don't think it will work well in Auckland for the simple matter that the city centre is the least congested part of the city. I, and many others commute across town without going anywhere near the city centre. Its take me an hour to travel 30km in the morning and 1hr 10min to travel the same 30km in the evening.

Your example of East Tamaki is a prime example. I work here and the afternoon peak hour starts from about 2:30pm and doesn't finish until 6:00pm. There are many more places on the outskirts all over the city that are similarly congested but I don't think East Tamaki is one of the worst.

You could apply the congestion charge to the arterials that allow people to get to such places, but then people will just "rat-run" around the arterials and turn side roads into parking lots. But it has been deemed a success in London.

johno1234

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#3143649 6-Oct-2023 16:00

Journeyman:

A congestion charge for the CBD will be the final nail in the coffin. There are already plenty of reasons not to venture into the city and this may be the one to finally turn it into a ghost town.

I think a congestion charge would ironically make it more likely I would drive into the CBD. I'd pay a charge if it meant a quick, low stress drive.

But yeah, Auckland CBD can be a violent, threatening high crime area with a lot of drunk, drugged, homeless, begging or mentally unwell people. It's not a nice place outside of Commercial Bay, Viaduct through to Wynyard Quarter.

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#3143655 6-Oct-2023 16:24

Journeyman: A congestion charge for the CBD will be the final nail in the coffin. There are already plenty of reasons not to venture into the city and this may be the one to finally turn it into a ghost town.

I disagree. The built up the side of a 2km hill geography has always been a massive discourager for getting around the city. That has always been the biggest of the plenty reasons. The CRL is going to be a massive boost for city central economy all year round and in all weather.

Many places with that kind of transport overseas residents and visitors alike need very little idea of above-ground geography. They simply go down one escalator and pop up at the theatre or pub or the supermarket or the movies or whatever takes your fancy, in any order.

A congestion charge will reduce unnecessary traffic and make the inner-city area a much more viable and pleasant place to live, work and play in addition to encouraging users on to the CRL.

gzt

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#3143657 6-Oct-2023 16:30

johno1234: I think a congestion charge would ironically make it more likely I would drive into the CBD. I'd pay a charge if it meant a quick, low stress drive.

Further ironically - it is likely to free up additional commerical and public parking spaces in the city and make operating a parking ~~racket~~ area or building far less economic. Ak city has a terrible history of bowling stuff over and replacing it with paid parking so I won't be crying over that one aspect at least.

johno1234

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#3143669 6-Oct-2023 17:24

gzt:
johno1234: I think a congestion charge would ironically make it more likely I would drive into the CBD. I'd pay a charge if it meant a quick, low stress drive.

Further ironically - it is likely to free up additional commerical and public parking spaces in the city and make operating a parking racket area or building far less economic. Ak city has a terrible history of bowling stuff over and replacing it with paid parking so I won't be crying over that one aspect at least.

I think Auckland Council is planning to bowl the downtown carpark building which will make a huge dent in parking options.

ezbee

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#3143671 6-Oct-2023 17:30

Wlisons parking does not mind the increase to their market domminance :-)

Its a pity Auckland does not have more projects for the experienced CRL workers to move onto as it winds down.

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#3143674 6-Oct-2023 17:40

johno1234: I think Auckland Council is planning to bowl the downtown carpark building which will make a huge dent in parking options.

They already did that with a massive price increase for use between Monday and Friday.

Scott3

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#3144105 7-Oct-2023 17:53

I am very much of the opinion that for Auckland (and Tauranga for that matter), that a congestion charge couldn't only target the CBD.

For Auckland the CBD is actually not that congested compared to places like East Tamaki, so I don't think it could be justified from a congestion reduction point of view. And from a revenue-raising point of view, this needs to raise enough money to replace the regional fuel tax, which was applied on every liter of fuel sold in the wider city (Even that destined for recreational boating and the likes). Havn't run the numbers, but there my assumption is there is no way the CBD traffic alone could reasonably do this.

I think either a motorway charge (i.e. X $ for entering the Auckland motorway network, depending on time of day / congestion level) would be the most viable option, stacked with a few non-motorway zone boundaries, to discourage long distance motorway avoidance. Possible zone boundaries, below. I have drawn double lines, and propose only vehicles that cross both lines get charged, hence avoiding very short trips from locals near the zone boundaries from getting charged:

Or we could drop the fee for any motorway trip fee, and just do a boundary system:

Either way I think we should exempt vehicles who enter one side of the Auckland region, and exit the opposite side within say 4 hour's. Seems a bit harsh to charge people who are simply passing through Auckland with the fee. Rest of the country dislikes us enough already. Likewise, I think it is reasonable people passing through can stop for fuel, food, playground etc, without financial impact.

Charges could either be per zone boundary, so a simple daily charge, regardless of how many boundaries.

For Tauranga, the CBD is simply not strong enough for to take a expensive policy angled at it. Would need to be a zone / boundry system, perhaps:

Of course it would be more efficient to have a GPS based system, which charges per km depending on congestion level of the particular road, but the above approaches could easily be managed via number plate recognition camera's, something that has become both cheap and common.

Senecio

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#3144123 7-Oct-2023 21:09

Maybe I'm being dumb....

But if a congestion charge won't reduce congestion (in the CBD) and it's only designed to raise revenue, to invest infrastructure for the region. Then why don't they just leave the regional fuel tax in place?

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#3144364 8-Oct-2023 18:06

Senecio:

Maybe I'm being dumb....

But if a congestion charge won't reduce congestion (in the CBD) and it's only designed to raise revenue, to invest infrastructure for the region. Then why don't they just leave the regional fuel tax in place?

A congestion charge can very much reduce congestion. Plenty of overseas examples of that. Suspect the example designs I posted above, while not being CBD targeted, would have the effect of reducing congestion across the roading network, including the CBD.

ezbee

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#3144370 8-Oct-2023 18:44

Mr Brown is looking at a very big hole created by removal of petrol tax.

The congestion charge would have to capture a large area to make up the income.
Then you have the problem of inefficiency of collection.

With our existing toll roads a lot goes into chasing those that don't pay.
If someone is on limited income, then court will reduce that to $1 a week or something if you bother to go that far.
Overhead to manage the infrastructure, number plate readers, and matching and online payment system etc.

Problem is without a large catchment to pay for its establishment then someone has to stump up a subsidy to create it.
Last time it was proposed the Southern Motorway threshold was before Manukau City !

Then there are Trucks.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/local-government/132583820/5m-subsidy-from-auckland-ratepayers-fails-to-reduce-port-freight-on-roads

""
The swing away from rail to road is the opposite of what the mayor Wayne Brown has called for, and comes as a bigger truck fleet cuts prices in order to grab a declining number of import containers.
""

Only Westfield and Wiri getting triple tracking to get more frequent freight trains past more frequent passenger trains.
Then we have the problems of maintenance backlog making rail unavailable or limited availability for months at a time while its sorted.

At least Pukekohe is finally on way to being electrified.

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Qazzy03

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#3144374 8-Oct-2023 18:55

ezbee:

Mr Brown is looking at a very big hole created by removal of petrol tax.

The congestion charge would have to capture a large area to make up the income.

Reminds me of when a certain party bought votes with $20 per week tax cuts and then raised GST from 12.5% to 15%.

Everyone will cheer when the fuel tax is gone..... but that leaves a really big hole that will need to be filled another way.

Handle9

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#3144398 9-Oct-2023 03:25

Senecio:
Maybe I'm being dumb....

But if a congestion charge won't reduce congestion (in the CBD) and it's only designed to raise revenue, to invest infrastructure for the region. Then why don't they just leave the regional fuel tax in place?

Because removing the regional fuel tax was dumb.

GV27

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#3144400 9-Oct-2023 06:42

Handle9:

Because removing the regional fuel tax was dumb.

I'm OK with removing it but only because it's only collected in Auckland. It was functionally just an extra tax on Aucklanders. Really, everyone should be paying one. There's also the not-insignificant amount of any government contribution to an Auckland project that is actually funded from Auckland anyway. And it's very hard to justify when the LGWM program was funded at 60/40 from the Government and they have no fuel tax at all, nor will they. Meanwhile, Auckland has to bear 50% of the CRL costs in addition to the fuel tax.

Apply it to everyone and I'm happy for Auckland to still have it.

Senecio

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#3144405 9-Oct-2023 07:57

Scott3:

A congestion charge can very much reduce congestion. Plenty of overseas examples of that. Suspect the example designs I posted above, while not being CBD targeted, would have the effect of reducing congestion across the roading network, including the CBD.

but we’ve just spent 2 pages confirming that we don’t have congestion in the CBD and that’s how a congestion charge is used in every city that has one.

You cant charge people if they’re just going from Manakau to East Tamaki.

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