ORAM Thinking outside the oval
Are Wellington councils turning a blind eye to the best alternative so far to the flawed Basin flyover?
WHEN WE look back in years to come at the renaissance of our cities, hopefully we’ll see that last week’s rejection of a proposed flyover across the Basin Reserve in Wellington was a crucial turning point.
The draft decision by the board of inquiry offers deep knowledge and insight on the fabric and workings of our capital city. The lessons apply just as forcefully, though, to all our towns and cities.
Based on the extensive expert evidence they heard, the board members judged in a 3-1 verdict that the flyover would do far more damage to the city than its minimal traffic benefits would justify. This decision gets right to the heart of how cities can become powerhouses of economic, social and cultural activity. Their physical setting, built environment and character attract people and capital to drive their progress. To borrow a phrase from the late Sir Paul Callaghan, they are places ‘‘where talent wants to live’’.
Wellington’s film, IT, creative industries and similar sectors show some of that potential. But they still contribute only a small part of the city and region’s activity. Overall, the regional economy is deeply stagnant.
Yet, Wellington has a beautiful setting and the only compact, walkable city centre in Australasia. It could be a great and prosperous city if it played to its strengths.
The board of inquiry, chaired by retired Environment Court judge Gordon Whiting, was required to consider the flyover in that crucial broader context rather than narrowly on transport issues.
The directive was clear in the statement from Environment Minister Amy Adams that established the inquiry last year and in the nature and history of the Resource Management Act.
The current National-led Government created the board-ofinquiry system to fast-track consent decisions on significant infrastructure projects. Some people, including me, feared that fast would mean superficial.
But this board and the one that ruled recently on the Ruataniwha dam and irrigation project in Hawke’s Bay have proved their worth. They have been rapid but thorough, delivering wise, evidence-based decisions.
This board sat for 72 days of hearings and received 215 submissions captured in more than 8000 pages of transcripts. Of the submitters, 82.7 per cent opposed the flyover in full or in part.
The project’s proposer, NZ Transport Agency on behalf of the government, was on the back foot throughout. Expert witnesses challenged it on every aspect, even on its core traffic modelling and roading skills. The board was also sharply critical of NZTA’s overall performance, particularly its failure to adequately consider alternatives.
During the hearings, traffic experts concluded the $90 million flyover would save only 90 seconds of travel time in peak morning traffic in 2021. Buses would save only one minute in the morning and 39 seconds in the evening.
Balanced against this, the threemember majority of the board concluded that the project would ‘‘constitute an inappropriate development within this significant heritage area of the city’’.
Moreover: ‘‘The significant adverse effects . . . would not, in our view, be adequately mitigated or offset by the proposed mitigation measures. We have found that the main cause of the adverse effects is the dominance of the Basin Bridge arising out of its bulk and scale, and the mitigation measures would do little to reduce that dominance and, in the case of the Northern Gateway Building [a proposed big new stand at the Basin Reserve designed to block a view of the flyover], would exacerbate it.’’
The dissenting board member, David McMahon, judged the traffic benefits warranted the adverse impact on the neighbourhood.
While NZTA was weak on its core traffic skills, it was particularly woeful on the wider urban issues. For example, Jan McCredie, a former Wellington City Council manager of strategy and urban design who now lives and works in Sydney, gave eight reasons why the flyover was contrary to the council’s ‘‘Smart Capital’’ longterm strategy and its urban development strategy.
The main reasons NZTA got this so wrong are: it has an intensely narrow fixation on roads; it is deeply reluctant to concede that per-capita road use is dwindling in New Zealand and other developed countries; and it understands little about the urban development imperatives that make great cities.
Moreover, in a bullying tactic, it threatened to withdraw other transport funding if the city council didn’t drop its opposition to the flyover. With councillor Andy Foster playing the pivotal role, the council ended up backing the flyover. Likewise the regional council’s vision is seriously limited. It too is in the thrall of NZTA and roads at the expense of creating a dynamic urban economy.
Both councils and the chamber of commerce expressed surprise and disappointment at the board’s decision. Both responses were dead wrong. If they had followed proceedings closely, they would have appreciated the weight of evidence and understood the logic of the decision. Worse, though, they see the decision as a serious setback for Wellington. Foster is particularly negative, arguing it stalls public transport plans. He and many others can see no alternative now the flyover proposal is dead.
But there is. One fully researched alternative was presented in extensive evidence. It is the Basin Reserve Roundabout Enhancement Option developed by Richard Reid. He is an architect and landscape architect with a track record of design improvements in Auckland such as State Highway 20 at Onehunga and Mt Roskill, and the Victoria Park road tunnel.
This option would remove traffic bottlenecks and enable bus rapid transit around the Basin Reserve, deliver almost the same traffic benefits as the flyover, accommodate a twinning of the Mt Victoria tunnel and create urban development and landscaping in the neighbourhood that the flyover would have thwarted. The board’s draft decision concluded the option merited further study.
But the councils’ response so far is to ignore it and to talk of rushing off to seek some other solution. This is a grave mistake. The wealth of wisdom and knowledge captured by the board’s report and by the alternative proposal offer abundant opportunities.
Wellington could use those resources to play to the great trends in urban development, economic and social, which are reshaping the world. A detailed analysis of those is available in this columnist’s submission to the board of inquiry. You can download it from the board’s website at http://bit.ly/UtvVKf.
The Basin Reserve deserves to be the icon of New Zealand urban renewal. Disclosure: Rod Oram is a pro-bono adviser to Richard Reid.