Wasn’t it interesting to note in the recent Herald article about the most congested roads in Auckland, that without exception all those noted in our neighbourhoods had been “Improved” by Auckland Transport (AT)!
In particular the deliberate congestion inflicted on us all by AT in Meola Road, Ponsonby Road, Great North Road etc requires answers as to why AT spent over $100,000,000 of ratepayers and tax payers money to “Improve” these key thoroughfares by deliberately congesting them to the point where some of them have traffic flow rates of just nine kilometres per hour.
How does that “improve” our lives?
Answer: It doesn’t!
The AT strategy of deliberately congesting major thoroughfares while closing lanes for normal traffic but protecting those lanes for buses has not added any benefit or value to the significant majority of the population. Indeed, it has inflicted a much worse situation on the lives of all of us.
Thank goodness AT has been disbanded.
Now we can only hope and pray that council does not just employ the same drones from within AT, for the new structure within council.
New leadership and new, more customer focused performance is essential.
New and more practical thinking is required by the new staff, and these new staff must be more personally connected with, and responsive to, the communities they serve.
More of the same destructive practices that AT implemented is simply unacceptable.
Meola Road was highlighted to AT and council as an emerging nightmare well before planning was approved, yet AT obtusely proceeded with their plans despite obvious and more appropriate solutions available to them.
The cycle lane on just the eastern side already existed and a simple white line down the middle, as used in many other locations would have easily separated pedestrians from cyclists,
Removing parking in Meola Road, that had been used by parents watching children's sports, customers visiting MOTAT, or people walking their dogs was simply spiteful, and totally unnecessary.
Add in multiple speed bumps, pedestrian crossings, bus stops that project out into the thoroughfares (and stop all the traffic) and you have the simply dumbest example of bureaucratic stupidity of the last 20 years.
AT destroyed themselves by not listening to their victims.
It is now up to councillors and the mayor to quickly correct these classic mistakes - all of which are classic examples of group think stupidity that AT management and their board have inflicted on us all.
AT staff will try and argue that it will be too expensive to correct their mistakes (as they successfully did with West Lynn, after ruining the shopping centre there), but these mistakes must now be quickly rectified to immediately relieve the congestion that AT deliberately caused - despite being told by many, of the obvious problems before they proceeded.
Better to quickly fix the problem now, rather than wait for public frustration and anger to fester!
Roger Hawkins
Herna Bay
