Greens transport policy ignorant about Auckland

Monday, August 8th, 2005

Greens transport policy ignorant about Auckland

The Greens so called transport policy for Auckland demonstrates a remarkable level of ignorance on the scale of the issues facing Auckland, the Employers & Manufacturers Association (Northern) says.

"The Greens have not done their home work on the region's traffic flows and commuter movements," said Alasdair Thompson, EMA's chief executive.

"They want to abandon the western ring route and build a rail network around Auckland's CBD instead.

"The plan will turn off tens of thousands of commuters who come into Auckland every day only to head out of it again, en route to Manukau,
Waitakere, North Shore and places in between.

"Commuters don't want to be stuck doing that forever.

"We expect far more innovation from the Greens on transport. No original thought has gone into how the policy could be implemented, or on managing public impatience while it was.

"Everyone wants to see urgent action on the construction of better public transport, but the Greens policy is just a wish list of high sounding platitudes which can't meet the transport needs of 90 per cent of Auckland's population."

ENDS

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