Mayor Wayne Brown has spent much of his time in office bemoaning the role of Wellington in how Auckland plans for the future often saying “Wellington needs to stop planning Auckland“. But on Friday he happily handed control of the city’s transport future over to Wellington, labelling it “a major victory for the people of Auckland“.

Late last year, the Mayor and then-Minister of Transport (and still Minister for Auckland) Simeon Brown announced a shake up of Auckland Transport that would, among other things, see the policy and planning functions of Auckland Transport shifted back to the council. The council would also become the local Road-Controlling Authority (RCA), while AT would continue to exist as a council-controlled organisation focused on delivering transport projects and services.

Friday’s announcement and the release of accompanying legislation stepped the changes up a notch, with the delivery of projects and maintenance also now shifting back to the council – leaving AT solely focused on the delivery of public transport. Under the headline “Restoring democracy to Auckland’s transport“, the media release says:

The most significant reforms to transport in Auckland since 2010 will restore democratic accountability and ensure Aucklanders can hold their elected representatives responsible for transport policies, Transport Minister Chris Bishop, Auckland Minister Simeon Brown, and Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown say.

“Late last year we committed to this significant change to transport governance and delivery arrangements in Auckland. It will deliver better outcomes for Aucklanders and help to restore confidence in Auckland Transport,” Mr Bishop says.

“Auckland’s transport system needs strong, appropriate governance to ensure people and goods can move across the city efficiently and safely, while ensuring value for money from every dollar spent by central government and Auckland Council.

“Responsibility for most transport functions will shift from Auckland Transport to Auckland Council, including all policy and planning work. The Council will become the road controlling authority and deliver transport capital projects while maintaining transport infrastructure,” Mr Bishop says.

“Auckland Transport will become a smaller transport council-controlled-organisation so it can focus on its core role of delivering high-quality public transport services for Aucklanders.

“These changes mean that Auckland Council’s elected members will be directly accountable to the public for most transport decisions that affect the daily lives of Aucklanders.

“The Local Government (Auckland Council) (Transport Governance) Amendment Bill establishes the Auckland Regional Transport Committee, which will comprise an equal share of Auckland Council elected members and Ministerial appointees anlongside [sic] an independent chair.

“The Committee will prepare a 30-year transport plan for Auckland, building on the previous Auckland Transport Alignment Project started by the last National Government, which will steer investment and shape the future of transport in Auckland.

“This aligned approach between central government and Auckland Council is critical for delivering the transport system Aucklanders deserve.”

The Auckland Regional Transport Committee (RTC) is how the mayor has handed over control to the government. The government will get to appoint three of the six voting members, and along with the mayor gets to pick the independent chairperson. The Minister also has to sign-off the key output of the RTC – a 30-year transport plan. In no other region does the government do this.

As a thought experiment: had this system been in place in 2010, I wonder if we would even be close to having the City Rail Link completed. Thinking back to those times, I can easily imagine the government appointees on an RTC just blocking the project from having any priority. And as to whether all three locally appointed members would think the same way, and which way the independent chairperson leans, that’s quite a roll of the dice.

At Friday’s announcement, Minister of Transport Chris Bishop said that Auckland will for once have a 30-year transport plan and as noted above, says it will build on ATAP (the Auckland Transport Alignment Project which was designed to bring central and local government together around the larger, long-term aims for transport in the region – with varying effect over the years).

The reality is, we’ve had plenty of 30-year plans before. That’s exactly what the Auckland Plan is: it was created in 2012 and updated in 2018. Alongside this, ATAP was an attempt to get evidence-based alignment between the government and council – but despite the agreement, the government never stepped up for its share of the funding, and government agencies like Waka Kotahi/ NZTA largely ignored it.

There doesn’t appear to be anything to prevent this outcome being repeated again. And given this new 30-year plan is required to be aligned to government policy of the day, a key question is could the 30-year plan change each time there’s a new government? And should it?

Local Boards get some* power

Another major aspect of the change – although the devil and/or angel will be in the detail – is handing power back to Local Boards when it comes to decision-making on many local roads. Back to the media release:

“The Bill also gives local boards some new powers to ensure local accountability and that local communities have a say. They’ll make decisions on local and collector roads including setting speed limits, closing roads for events, managing parking and creating cycleways.

“Arterial roads, and the city centre, will be the responsibility of the Governing Body of Auckland Council, consisting of the Mayor and 20 Councillors.

“This is great news for Auckland. This Government is committed to improving transport in Auckland and putting decision-making back in the hands of Aucklanders. This will boost productivity and economic growth by providing for better accessibility, reduced congestion and increased urban density.

Simeon Brown seems hopeful this will mean our roads will be less safe, with (in his vision for our city) local boards ripping out “speed bumps and cycleways”. But there are many local boards who will want to do the exact opposite, and many communities who will be happy to be able to choose safer streets.

As I highlighted back in December, the risk here is ending up with a bit of a post-code lottery on fundamental things like whether it’s safe for your child to be able to walk to school.

The legislative constraints (e.g. the current Speed Rule’s effective prohibition of 30km/h as a speed-setting option for neighbourhoods) will be one issue. There’s also a major issue around budgets (see also the deeply ideological GPS of the current government, which we’ve described as a disaster for local government, and which Auckland Council itself identified as a barrier to desired outcomes). And then there’s the question of local board expertise in transport matters.

So yes, local boards might get decision-making powers – but will they have any money to actually do anything meaningful on the ground? Could we end up in a situation where local boards get bullied by (central and local) government in much the same way councils are bullied by the government – where money is only available if local boards are doing things the council approve of?

How will council and local boards ensure they get the expert advice to make effective decisions – and what will determine whether that advice will be consistent across the region?

From AT to APT: Auckland Transport as a Public Transport-only Organisation

My main concern with AT being left as a PT-only organisation is that the separating out of public transport creates risks around being able to properly align public transport service and infrastructure. For example, who’ll be in charge of the delivery of bus lanes that could help improve bus services or the number and location of bus stops? And the outcome is that this separation of powers could slow services down.

It is worth noting here that Transport for London (TfL) – which looks like a bit of a model for this change – is similarly a dedicated PT operator. The key difference is that it also has control of arterial roads with bus routes. TfL also fully controls the Underground, Overground, and Crossrail rail services and infrastructure in London.

Whereas here  in Tāmaki Makaurau, AT will still be hostage to KiwiRail to operate their rail services.

Also: TfL’s board has no central government appointees, and is a wholly London creature, chaired by the mayor with one other councillor on a very diverse board of 17 members.

On the plus side, I do wonder if this new structure will mean AT will be able to drop its shackles when it comes to public transport. Currently, the need of the organisation to be everything-to-everyone gives the impression that AT can’t go as strongly as it could or should on both its plans and desires for public transport. This even trickles down to things like its marketing of services.

An old advertising campaign from Los Angeles Metro – an independent PT delivery organisation for the LA area

Many in the public and media have loved to blame Auckland Transport for everything they see wrong, and there are certainly many times that AT hasn’t showered itself in glory. I think AT has failed – but in the opposite way that someone like Simeon Brown does.

It didn’t do anywhere near enough to change our streets and deliver agreed-upon strategies when it could have, even and especially when it had the wind at its back. Even the most minor changes became mountains to climb. It regularly undermined council and even its own policies, often to appease a small number of people opposed to change – or even just because someone within the organisation apparently didn’t like it.

AT was very poor at the politics of change – will council, with government appointees in key positions, be better?

And, for all its faults, will we miss AT once it’s gone?

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