4 August 2005

Priorities set for extra $500 million in transport funding

State highways, local roads and Auckland passenger rail services are set to benefit from an additional $500 million in transport funding.

Government announced the availability of the extra funding in June this year.

The Land Transport New Zealand Board approved allocations of the extra funding at its meeting last week.

The $500 million, exclusive of GST, is to be allocated over four years through the National Land Transport Fund - $95 million in 2005/06, $125 million in 2006/07, $140 million in 2007/08 and $140 million in 2008/09.

Three main priority areas are to benefit from the additional funds:

- State highways ($390 million, including $50 million to be spent in 2009/10 - 2010/11)
- Local government transport projects ($52.5 million)
- Auckland passenger rail ($50 million).

The remaining $7.5 million has been set aside for the development of an Operator Rating System for commercial road users, which will help operators to improve their safety performance and allow compliance resources to be more efficiently targeted at poorly performing operators.

Land Transport NZ chair Dr Jan Wright says the extra transport funding has been allocated to the areas of greatest need, where effective and efficient initiatives can be implemented over the next four years.

“This funding will benefit key road projects like Auckland’s Western Ring Route and the Waikato Expressway, it will help speed up implementation of high priority rail projects in Auckland, and it will benefit other regions through the construction of local roads and localised safety improvements to state highways,” Dr Wright said.

Transit New Zealand is producing an amended State Highway Forecast detailing changes resulting from the extra funding, to be released next week.
The $500 million in additional transport spending is over and above a further $660 million in funding announced by Government last month to improve passenger transport and develop the Western corridor in Wellington, and $150 million announced yesterday for transport projects in Bay of Plenty.

The extra funds increase the total 10-year forecast for the National Land Transport Programme (NLTP) to $22.3 billion. The NLTP is being amended to reflect changes to allocations resulting from the additional funding, with specific amendments to be posted on the Land Transport NZ website next week.

ENDS

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