Auckland City’s transport committee has infuriated communities in the path of the Waterview motorway by supporting the Government’s preference for a revised “surface-tunnel” option.

“I’m absolutely gutted by the response from our council – I think they have been irresponsible,” Margi Watson, Waterview-based spokesman of the Tunnel or Nothing protest group, said yesterday.

“The council was elected to represent the interests of communities, not the Government.”

Members of the ruling Citizens and Ratepayers bloc, led by Deputy Mayor David Hay, outvoted minority City Vision and independent councillors in backing the revised scheme, which the Transport Agency estimates will cost $1.4 billion.

That differs from the council’s previous support for a pair of deep tunnels to carry traffic along most of a 4.5km link between the Southwestern and Northwestern Motorways, and will provide extra comfort to the agency’s board when it meets in Auckland late this month to approve the new plan.

City Vision councillor Cathy Casey said the council had “let down the people of Waterview and is no more than a puppet of the National Government” and teammate Graeme Easte warned of high mitigation costs from a project he claimed would undermine a key council policy of building stronger communities.

Leaders of the Eden-Albert and Western Bays community boards have also lashed out at the decision.

But transport committee chairman Ken Baguley said the previous Labour-led Government provided no funds for the costlier twin tunnels, which were not without their environmental challenges, including vehicle emissions.

He said the motorway link was needed to deliver $800 million of annual economic benefits from completing the ring route.

Given that there was no chance of persuading the Government to resurrect the twin tunnels, the council needed to concentrate on ensuring communities affected by the new scheme received fair compensation and mitigation.

The new scheme compares with a Treasury estimate of $2.77 billion for the twin tunnels, although that included $554 million in financing charges absent from the revised version.

It will include a 1.15km bored tunnel between Owairaka and Avondale Heights and a 700m covered trench beneath Great North Rd, with a strong likelihood the two structures will be joined to keep traffic underground for more than 2km. It will also keep the traffic further from the bush-clad lower reaches of Oakley Creek than other cheaper options, one of which would have entailed a 520m viaduct.

But it will involve demolishing up to 365 homes, as well as slicing through more than 1km of upstream green space in Owairaka.

The city council’s urban design review team is not satisfied the lower creek will survive unscathed, saying in a report that it was concerned to learn concrete “boxes” for the motorway trench under the Great North Rd ridge-line might be wider than first thought.

“We consider this could have a severe adverse impact on the corridor, with serious consequences for Oakley Creek, and is likely to mean an over-scale road on top of the motorway boxes that cannot deliver a best-practice liveable arterial.”

Auckland business leaders are pushing the Government to save more than $1 billion by controversially building the Waterview motorway link across country, rather than through tunnels.

A report sent to Transport Minister Steven Joyce by the Auckland Business Forum is set to unleash furious debate at a time when political parties are preparing to contest a byelection in the local Mt Albert electorate soon to be vacated by former Prime Minister Helen Clark.

The Auckland Business Forum claims a return of $3 for every $1 invested if a non-tunnel option was chosen.  That figure sounds too good to be true.  Meanwhile Duncan MacDonald of the Avondale Community Board says

“If the Government is of a mind to do it cheaper, then it won’t get done,” he told the Herald. “I’ll have every person living in Waterview and Mt Albert out there stopping it.”

I think National have their work cut out if they believe they can win Mt Albert at the same time as bowling 400 houses and alienating every community group in the process.

Government motorway builders are preparing to move bulldozers on to the Onehunga waterfront this week, despite efforts by a community group to tie them to an alleged 35-year-old promise to provide sandy beaches.

The Transport Agency says its contractors can wait no longer to extend their $230 million motorway duplication project across Manukau Harbour to the foreshore, after giving the Onehunga Enhancement Society until March 31 to reach a funding agreement with Auckland City and the regional council on an 11ha reclamation plan

Meanwhile, the Onehunga Enhancement Society says:

“There needs to be a memorandum of understanding signed off by key stakeholders in this project to ensure the non-delivery of promises made over the last 30 years is avoided at all costs. If we can get an MOU and substantial [financial] figures for the 11ha and a substantial bridge linking Onehunga to its waterfront, I’m sure we could satisfy our community and avoid the potential for a judicial review.”

 I think this is about to get very interesting.