Tracks to NZTA, KiwiRail a partial listed stand alone freight State Owned Enterprise
While I have been writing posts on rail and contemplating Budget 2015 in regards to transport (i.e not a lot apart from reaffirmation in accelerating the Southern Motorway upgrade (starts October)) I was pondering if there was a better way to handle KiwiRail.
KiwiRail is admittedly a money black hole thanks to neglect to our rail system by both sides since the late 80’s (made worse in 93). However, KiwiRail is not a lost cause as rail is the most efficient and economical form of moving people and freight over longer distances on land. But I wonder if improving our rail could be handled differently and give New Zealand better results.
What I am thinking is splitting KiwiRail into two:
Tracks and associated infrastructure get flipped to NZTA who look after the State Highway network. This way a single agency is: planning, operation, maintaining and investing in both land transport modes under a single umbrella. It also means rail comes under the National Land Transport Fund envelope when it is listed alongside road projects. Given that the NLTF is meant to priorities the best valued investments at the top it would be most likely not uncommon for rail to take three of the top five NLTF spots.
Freight operations including rolling stock and rolling stock maintenance facilities spun off into a stand alone State Owned Enterprise. While being an SOE though I would have 49% of it listed on the NZX to allow fresh capital and NZX oversight to this division.
With the freight side spun off though I would also allow others to run their own rolling stock (while paying access fees to NZTA) on the tracks if they are inclined to do so. Port of Tauranga might be such a contender with its growing Metro Port services. That said KiwiRail freight operations could also see another source of revenue by the private rail freight companies tendering their rolling stock maintenance to KiwiRail as well.
So what do you think? Something Bill English should actively investigate? Would it help our rail system as well as the Government books. Would it help our Economy most of all?
West condemned to Commuter status unless it diversifies job base A running theme through the comments department over the last month (although I have brought it up in the past) … Continue reading West Auckland Needs Heavy Industry
I was forwarded the following article on the Dutch city of Nijmegen not only engineering to combat flooding but also using that engineering (and planning) to literally build a new city core as well.
An extract from CityLab:
A Dutch City Makes Room for Its River and a New Identity
Nijmegen is turning a flood-control project on the River Waal into an opportunity to redevelop its inner core.
NIJMEGEN, The Netherlands — In this city along the River Waal, this year marks the 20th anniversary of a scary event that quite nearly turned into a catastrophe.
Heavy rains upstream in France and Germany, where the river is known as the Rhine, sent a surge of water toward Nijmegen. The city of 170,000 people is protected by dikes. But as the waters rose and fear built that the dikes would break, many people and cattle in and around Nijmegen evacuated. Luckily, the dikes held, and after several harrowing days, the water level dropped again.
There’s two reasons why. First, Nijmegen is not simply raising or strengthening its dikes, which might seem like the obvious solution. Instead, it is moving some dikes back from the river, essentially creating a much wider floodplain. Into that floodplain, excavators and cranes are carving a new channel for the River Waal. That channel is broadening the river—and giving future floodwaters more room to flow without threatening the city.
The second reason is that all this engineering work is creating a whole lot more than flood control. Construction of the new channel also means that a new island is being made in the middle of the Waal. The island’s elevation is high enough in some spots that it will be possible to construct a whole new section of the city here, along with parks and nature areas.
Meanwhile, a new neighborhood is rising across the river from the city center, bringing some balance to the urban development on both sides of the river. And four new bridges are being built, connecting the new island to both sides of the river. When it is all done, Nijmegen will have a new urban heart in the middle of the very river that has occasionally threatened its existence.
“For the first time,” says Alderman Bert Velthuis, “the city center will actually be in the middle of the city.”
Never underestimate the Dutch in their creativity with planning and engineering. In saying that though they were quite amused and have taken up our own created term of #quaxing (in honour of our Dutch born Councillor Dick Quax) to recognise doing the shopping by active and public transport modes.
Talking Southern Auckland 