Takapu Valley – It’s Just Too Easy

The Petone to Grenada roading project has been on the books for many years, its purpose being to alleviate the peak hour build-up of traffic at the Ngauranga SH2/SH1 junction. That traffic build up reached its zenith about 10 years ago and has, for all intents and purposes, remained static ever since. Then, in January 2014 NZTA produced a study that advocated, amongst other things, the continuance of the Petone to Grenada road parallel to the existing SH1 and either turning it north to go up the Takapu Valley to join the Transmission Gully highway at the Belmont sub-station, or having it feed into a widened SH1 to join Transmission Gully at Linden. Two other options, essentially finishing the road at Grenada or Churton Park, were discarded in the study.

Well, as can be imagined, the debate immediately began to heat up as NZTA had, consciously or unconsciously, pitted two communities against each other. The people of the Takapu Valley stood to lose houses and substantial sections of farm land – their livelihood, and the people of Tawa stood to lose houses and property. Submissions were duly submitted by all interested parties by April 2014 and then began the wait as to the decision. In meantime there were several public meetings and as a result of those, NZTA agreed to be more open about its intentions with respect to this project.

Interested parties did hope to hear about progress towards a decision by attending meetings of the Road Transport Committee of the Greater Wellington Regional Council, but each time the RTC met, the Petone to Grenada project was not discussed. NZTA did hold meetings with several interested groups such as the Tawa Community Board and the Korokoro Environmental Group, but neither of those meetings provided much more information on where the project may have been heading than was produced in the original study back in January 2014.

Then in early March 2015, out of the blue, comes the announcement that the Takapu Valley option is the preferred one. A bit of a stunner for those affected, not the least because the announcement did not come from their elected representatives on the various Councils, but from the employees of those representatives. Clearly a lot has been going on behind the scenes out of the public eye. For example, in mid-2014 the GWRC had clearly stated that its position was against the Takapu Valley option, but now and for no obvious reason (obvious to the general public that is), here is the GWRC Chief Executive supporting the option and recommending it to the Council. An Official Information Request to the NZTA in December 2014 for the briefing papers on which the CEs have since based their decision has still not been filled more than 10 weeks later!

Such behind the scenes activity in this day and age is simply not acceptable. No matter what the outcome, this project will affect peoples’ lives and they deserve to be kept informed by their elected representatives, not by the employees of those representatives.

The report on the decision by the CEs is based almost solely on technical issues because at this stage of the project, environmental and social issues are consent matters, that is, such issues are not considered until the decision on where the project route will actually go is made and the project moves onto the Assessment of Environmental Effects phase. So arguments made now for protection of local wild life, clean air, clean water, loss off social amenities and so on, have no effect at this stage of the decision making process, and interestingly, Cost Benefit Analyses do not take consent matters into account. Oh, and by the way, it was on these grounds of consent matters that the Takapu Valley option for what is now the Transmission Gully route founded last time, all those years ago.

So to the technical matters then. The report on the decision sets out five main expected benefits:

Transport

The report states, ‘it is forecast that the difference in travel time between no capacity improvements north of Tawa and either SH1 widening or the Takapu Link is an additional 10-30 seconds in the AM peak period (southbound) and an additional 90-170 seconds in the PM peak period (northbound)’. Seconds we are talking here, not minutes. Given the estimated costs of up to $60 million that’s about $1,000,000 more or less per second (more in the morning, less in the evening). I could go on in this vein, for example about the four planned traffic islands and one set of lights crammed into the 500 metres between Takapu Road and Main Road Tawa which will supposedly ensure an efficient and orderly flow of traffic in that area, but it is useful to re-read the first paragraph as to what this project is about, the relief of congestion at Ngauranga. The report states that there will be big traffic problems there by 2031, but we have been unable to track down any figures whatsoever that support this assertion, and it flies in the face of all available NZTA current figures which show an essentially flat line traffic growth over the last 10+ years. So what is in the CE briefing papers that we don’t know?

Economic

The report states that transport benefits to Councils will be in the region of $700 million through access to jobs and markets. We have no idea how this figure was arrived at, what it is based on, or over what period this windfall will take place. Does it mean that people in Porirua will be able to save money by getting to Petone easier or cheaper or vice versa? Will trucks be able to go north from the Petone/Hutt industrial areas cheaper by using this route up Takapu Valley? In this latter regard, a cursory examination of the planned road between Petone and Grenada shows that trucks will have to negotiate climbing higher, up a steeper slope than the current Ngauranga Gorge Road, and significantly more so when compared with the much easier route up SH58. Again, the CE briefing papers supplied by NZTA must cover all this in detail and we can only wait patiently to be enlightened.

Resilience

Apparently the proposed project will provide an alternate route in the event of almost any calamity affecting SH1 and SH2 in the area. This seems to ignore the fact that the Takapu Valley has its own fault line (unsurveyed), that it will only be two lanes (one up, one down) so is easily blocked, that it is less than two kilometres from Transmission Gully at their widest separation – so what affects one is very likely to affect the other, and that there is no planned left turn at the top of the Valley so any problem between Tawa and Linden will require the usual routing through Tawa itself. If it is strategic resilience that is required, then the routes into/out of Wellington should be the current coastal route, Transmission Gully and SH58, all widely separated, each feeding a different section of the area, and very unlikely to all be closed together in a substantial disaster – all bets are off for the ‘big one’. So once again, the CE briefing papers must contain powerful arguments in this regard and we look forward to seeing them.

Environment

The report acknowledges, to an unspecified extent, the negative ecological impacts of the project, but does note the advantage to be gained by the reduced vehicle emissions brought about by the savings in travel time – remember those seconds of saving we talked about earlier. One could go on about how this project will have a huge effect on the Takapu Valley which forms one of the least developed and least polluted catchments for the Porirua Harbour, and for example, that the Takapu Stream is full of eels, bullies, Kokopu and other invertebrates that can be used to restock the Porirua Stream. However, as noted above, none of this ecological discussion matters at the moment because the project is not at the stage where it really needs to be considered. So pass on.

Public Transport

The report notes that some of the fill could be used to widen the Ngauranga – Petone rail corridor and that new bus services could use the new route too. In answer to that I would say if you are going to widen that rail corridor, then throw another couple of lanes onto SH2 as well. As a commuter who drove Tawa – Petone – Tawa every working day for 11 years, I can assure you that such a move would make an enormous contribution to reducing congestion. How likely is a widening of the rail corridor? Well that’s a question for NZ Rail or whoever looks after that sort of thing for rail, but let’s face it, it’s just a throwaway line that has been plucked from somewhere south to find a use for all that fill. As for the bus services, well, one would expect them to use the new road, that’s what it will be there for. Once again, we really need those CE briefing papers to see how these issues really stack up to close scrutiny.

Finally, a part of the report notes that one of factors taken into account by the CEs in selecting the Takapu Valley option is that it is going to be less disruptive to the surrounding community. As stated to me at one of NZTA’s open days at Linden by a youngish NZTA employee as we pored over a large scale map, ‘It’s much easier to punch a road up through green fields than p..s people off by working on the motorway.’ And that pretty much sums all of this up for me. Takapu Valley is the easy option, not the best, not the most economic, not the most efficient, not the most ecologically friendly, not the most resilient, not the most socially acceptable, it’s just too easy.

ENDS

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