What was intended to be a five-moment catchup on the letter he despatched the AT board in December turned into a whole half-hour of unsolicited engineering guidance.
This story was initially released on Things.
Auckland mayor Wayne Brown has advocated spraying oil on unsealed roadways and installing “dynamic lanes” on most of the city’s arterial routes.
Brown, who is a certified civil engineer, offered a assortment of unsolicited engineering tips to the full board of the council company Auckland Transport on Tuesday, in a scarce and impromptu – potentially the very first-at any time – presentation by a mayor.
The mayor’s look, at his request, was ostensibly to communicate for 5 minutes about his “Letter of Expectation”, despatched to the board in December outlining what the council desires it to target on.
Nevertheless in what turned a 30-moment presentation, irrespective of mayoral team attempting to get him to his future appointment, Brown revisited a lot of themes shut to his coronary heart as an engineer and internal city dweller. They included:
AT ought to look for information from Northland on how to develop unsealed rural roadways. “Oil sprays are a wonderful way to tackle rural roads – we’ve permitted the environmentalists to say it’s a undesirable factor.”
Change visitors flows on arterial routes concerning the morning and evening peak. “In the early morning everybody needs to come to city. Make it a single bus lane, automobile-in, car or truck-out and 1 lane for parking.”
Make cycle lanes less expensive. Use wide footpaths and “paint a strip” down the middle. “I share a 1.2m extensive footpath on Hopetoun Bridge with electric scooters, you really do not require 3-4 metre-vast cycleways.”
Do issues cheaper. “Everything is in excess of-specc’d, above developed, above protection, more than almost everything. This is not a rich country any far more.”
Brown also criticised the Whau Pathway coastal challenge in the west as about-engineered, too-large and unnecessarily built in precast concrete. “Three-quarters” could be knocked-off the cost by make it narrower and out of timber. “If the timber one moves up and down a minor bit above the many years in the mud, then what the hell?”
In response to the mayor telling AT’s board it should put up parking fines right away, the chairman Wayne Donnelly pointed out that fines ended up set by the Ministry of Transportation.
Brown made available to aid – seemingly unaware the challenges has been haggled about for many years in between community and central government, and is currently bundled into a wider piece of policy do the job at the Ministry.
The mayor appeared to believe that Auckland Transportation was additional down the highway of exploring his “dynamic lanes” suggestion than it genuinely is.
AT told Stuff a new dynamic lane could be trialled in “the future 12 or so months, if and the place suitable and feasible”.
“It is critical to take note that even though very simple in notion, dynamic lanes are only acceptable beneath specific disorders, and can be complicated to put into practice,” explained AT in a assertion.
The mayor considered dynamic lanes experienced the possible to “actually do a really serious challenge to Auckland Mild Rail”.
One of Brown’s concerns to the board went unanswered. “Who’s on the board and doesn’t have a hefty website traffic (truck) licence?” he questioned. “Because you should really have an HT licence if you are likely to explain to persons how to generate a truck, and I have acquired all people,” he mentioned.
Prior to, and soon after his election in Oct, Brown had known as for AT’s board to resign, and while its chairwoman did quickly and two other people followed, the rest have remained, together with the addition of two councillor-directors.