KiwiRail is call tenders early in the New Year for the supply of up to 114 electric multiple-unit cars for Auckland, following the cabinet’s approval of a NZ$500m loan on November 24.

The first of the 1 067 mm gauge EMUs will enter service on the Eastern and Western suburban lines in 2013. Auckland Regional Transport Authority will also lease up to 13 electric locomotives to haul ex-British Rail SA and SD coaches on the Southern Line.

Interestingly, the article also states that “the operation of suburban trains in Auckland and Wellington will be put out to tender.” Does that mean KiwiRail is exiting public transport in Wellington as well, since Auckland’s services are already contracted out to Veolia?

• KiwiRail subsidiaries will own the rolling stock (that means neither ARTA or the Greater Wellington Regional Council will own rolling stock, as currently proposed);
• Train operators will lease the rolling stock and operate services. This differs from the status quo in that Veolia currently operates Auckland’s rail services under contract to ARTA, while Tranz Metro in Wellington is a wholly-owned subsidiary of KiwiRail.

The model looks a little bit like the current system in the United Kingdom, minus franchises. This model has had mixed success, while passenger numbers on rail transport is up in the UK, overall service quality has decreased (although some argue that the correlation is related – poorer service results from higher demand, due to underinvestment during Government ownership).

The full paper is available at the Ministry of Transport.

Mr Joyce now seems to be deliberately taunting Aucklanders, promising all will be well, while slowly and publicly plucking the wheels off the trains, one by one.

He seemed to be deliberately mischievous last weekend when, while enthusing about roads, he told the Weekend Herald that “rail projects are [important] as well, but with the urban ones we need to know the impact on land-use planning in Auckland.”

He complained “there’s no business case or plans which says, ‘here’s where we’re going to put the two million people we’re told are going to live in Auckland in 22 years’.”

Whatever else Auckland local government can be criticised for, a failure to prepare reports is not one of them.

Read the rest of the article here.

A basic summary of the situation is that ARTA had an orginal budget of $512m, broken down in the table below:

Now, however, the Government has capped the electrification spend for rolling stock at $500m and at the same time transport planners have identified extra infrastructure spending necessary to remove bottlenecks and maintain 10 minute frequencies. Their recommended approach is shown in this table:

The upshot is that transport officials from ARTA, Veolia, Ontrack and the Government are proposing to reallocate $147m of a $410m budget for electric trains to projects unrelated to electrification, increased project management and project contingency. Yes that $54m (which includes lengthening platforms, signalling upgrades etc)  is probably necessary, but I would argue that it should come from the DART budget or the Kiwirail electrification budget, before the rolling stock budget is slashed.

Following through with this recommendation would see a 40% reduction in electric train seated capacity and sub optimal train schedules to cater for the continued use of old trains. The cheaper operating costs of electric trains are also ignored in the study. A comparison is here:

In addition the report also identifies the risk that there won’t be enough electric locomotives to continue utilising the electrified main trunk line between Hamilton and Palmerston North – diesel locomotives will be used instead.

The glimmer of hope appears to be Transport Minister Steven Joyce, reportedly unhappy with the recommendation.  Perhaps he recognises the need to give commuters the choice of using fast, efficient, non-polluting electric trains.  There is also credible evidence that oil fields are no longer producing as much oil as they were, or maybe he recognises the need to put forward practical measures to meet an emission reduction target of between 10 and 20%.

Whatever the reason, please Mr Joyce don’t let them do this.

When the new Government pulled the plug on the regional fuel tax six months ago, killing Auckland’s ability to buy itself a modern, electrified rapid-rail system, Transport Minister Steven Joyce told Aucklanders not to fret. He would come up with alternative funding arrangements.

Then in late May, after a trip to Australia, he returned full of the wonders of using a public-private partnership to buy the rolling stock.

He added that the PPP was not the only option being juggled by the Government and once more patted us on the head and said not to worry, electric rail was still on track for completion in 2013.

Reports now leaking out of Wellington paint a dispiriting picture of the alternatives being considered.

They suggest that far from being driven by a desire to create a first-world rapid-rail system such as any other city city of a similar size enjoys, the major driving force for this minister is a desire to meet the deadline as cheaply and Third Worldly as he can get away with.

Last December, after the passage of legislation supporting a regional fuel tax, the Auckland Regional Council called for expressions of interest internationally for the purchase of 140 electric rail cars.

A short list of seven suppliers had been selected at the time the Government’s action forced the process to be put on hold.

Industry sources suggest the Government now wants to almost halve the size of the new rail fleet to 75 and to make up the difference by collecting up all the second-hand electric locomotives that can be found around the country, giving them a lick of paint and an oil change, and pressing them into service dragging Auckland’s existing fleet of tarted-up old carriages.

Apparently a stockpile of retired electric locomotives in Palmerston North is being eyed up.

As well, some main trunk freight locomotives will become surplus to requirements, once the recently ordered fleet of 20 new freight locomotives arrives from China.

One report suggests more carriages may have to be bought.

Instead of the trains being short and swift and new, they will, because of the heavy freight locomotives pulling them, be long and slow to accelerate.

Another worry is the possibility that to save more money, the resurrected Onehunga branch line will not be electrified – a diesel shuttle will run back and forth instead – and the planned Parnell station will be shelved.

On Friday, Auckland Regional Council chairman Mike Lee said Aucklanders were running out of patience.

“We need those electric trains and we need to move now,” he said.

“We’re fed up with second-best for Auckland. We’ve had it since the 1950s, and this is going to be the end of it. We’re not going to meekly bow down and accept it.”

He called on Prime Minister John Key to tell his minister “to give at least as much commitment to mass transit in Auckland as you are to the holiday highways to the north of Auckland”.

An industry insider says that if money is the problem, Mr Joyce should do what the manager of any business-car fleet does, and approach the seven preferred tenderers with a lease-and-maintain deal instead of the original outright purchase proposition.

That way Aucklanders would get a new train fleet, not the Heath Robinson arrangement the Government is flirting with, and a guarantee of it being maintained. After 10 years or whatever, they could be replaced or kept on at a suitably adjusted price.

Buying this way would be more expensive than cash up front, but cheaper than a PPP scheme.

The advantage of a lease-and-maintain deal to a cash-strapped Government is that payments would be drip-fed. Also, the costs would be kept off the Government’s balance sheet, out of sight of the beady-eyed accountants from the international credit agencies.

Early this month, Finance Minister Bill English was bemoaning that it would take at least five years to catch up with Australia in infrastructure.

He told the Herald his advisers point to the economic benefits of getting infrastructure built to the right standards on time and to cost.

What better project to put this message into practice than Auckland’s long delayed rapid-rail system.

Auckland has renewed its calls for Government action on funding for electric trains before fuel taxes rise on 1 October.

“When the Government cancelled regional fuel tax funding for electric trains six months ago, the Transport Minister promised to fill the gap,” said ARC Chairman Mike Lee.

“He was going to have a plan by July, when he was to report back to cabinet. We heard nothing then. We in Auckland are running out of patience.

“As of this week, Auckland has lost half a year in its electrification programme. People in Auckland will soon be paying higher fuel taxes and road user charges, and still there is no sign of electric trains.

“There has been a lot of talk about electric trains by the Transport Minister but no hard cash. If Auckland is to develop a world-class public transport system, we need those electric trains and we need to move now.

“The Transport Minister has been active about building new roads and state highways. We would like him to also focus on just how important rapid transit is to Auckland, for the city’s economic growth, productivity and urban development.

“We call on the Transport Minister to honour his commitment to make up the funding shortfall the Government created when it did away with the Auckland regional fuel tax in March.

“We are aware that public transport use in Auckland is increasing by significantly more than it is in either Wellington or Christchurch. That momentum cannot be sustained without electric trains.”

Aucklanders took 58.6 million trips on public transport in the year to 30 June, a 7.7 per cent increase on 2007/08.