It is now more than four months since the Te Horo Road Action Committee (THRAC) chair, Peter Curling, requested explanations and justifications in the wake of the road decision announced by Transport Minister, Steven Joyce.
Mr Curling says THRAC is not opposed to a road but is opposed to the announced route of the expressway from Peka Peka to North Ōtaki. “So far we have got an admission that alternative options for the expressway advanced in submissions have not been investigated, this in spite of Steven Joyce and New Zealand Transport Agency’s (NZTA) Rob Whight assurances that all suggested routes would receive equal consideration”.
Apart from that and providing some but not all of the materials requested under the Official Information Act (OIA), NZTA after actually or essentially ignoring the explanations request for three months, has declared the request an OIA request and demanded an undertaking to meet costs estimated at more than $3000. Mr Curling says the group’s request is obviously a part of the consultation process and this latest stunt is another delaying tactic as NZTA evidently cannot justify the actions taken during the consultation process. “We have accordingly now filed complaints with the Ombudsman.”
Even local National MP Nathan Guy, who is also the Associate Minister of Transport, is having difficulty getting answers from NZTA according to Mr Curling. “Mr. Guy very kindly agreed to raise a number of questions with NZTA following meetings with THRAC in January and February,” says Curling, “but still no responses have been reported”.
NZTA has just announced an invitation to tender for detailed design and investigation work but, says Mr Curling, “We were told that these contracts were to be finalised by the end of March and, rather than signifying progress, is actually admitting delay.”
Mr Joyce has indicated that the Roads of National Significance (RoNS) is an urgent programme and, with that in mind, Mr Curling admits to “extreme puzzlement” as to why NZTA are “dragging the chain in so many areas.” For Mackays Crossing to Peka Peka, KCDC are entering into a consortium to progress detailed design and ultimate construction but north of Peka Peka is still shrouded in mystery. NZTA representatives were to have attended the last Ōtaki Community Board meeting in March but did not appear. Mr Curling is aware that NZTA have made some revelations to the OCB and is hopeful that Tuesday’s meeting “will be more enlightening than the last four months”. Might NZTA be reconsidering? “It’s a nice thought” comments Curling “but, on its face, any change would require re-consultation. We believe that legally and morally this should occur in any event having regard to what we see as a consultation-report-decision debacle but, who knows? NZTA presumably, but so far, they’re not telling”.
In the meantime, what does THRAC think of the Ōtaki Community Board-NZTA-police initiative to traffic light control the pedestrian crossing in Ōtaki? “As a major contributor to the bottlenecks, this change is years overdue,” says Mr Curling. “In truth, an electric ramp overbridge or tunnel, preferably both, would be better. Had this and other easily achieved modifications been made several years ago, we probably wouldn’t even be talking of an expressway this far north.”
