Twyford PhilHon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Transport): This is a very very good discussion so I appreciate the member raising that issue. The first point I want to make is that the core of the policy—the foundation really—is about rapid transit and that lies at the heart of our Government's policy around how we build successful cities. Successful cities need a very high level of mobility. If workers can't get to their jobs if firms can't get access to their workforce their customers or their suppliers productivity falls. So we have to deliver a high level of mobility. As cities get bigger and more densely populated that becomes more and more challenging. What we have to do in our cities—Auckland and let's say at least the other four high-growth centres the big imperative is that we have to move more people with fewer vehicles. That's why rapid transit is important.Why do we talk about rapid transit? Because it embraces a range of different modes from heavy rail light rail busways that are running on dedicated grade separated tracks and essentially it's high-frequency transport that is not competing directly with traffic. That's the working definition. So rapid transit is the thing that's important not necessarily the mode and then the idea is you make decisions about mode depending on the trade-offs between frequency cost and the terrain that you're moving through.So Auckland already has a Rapid Transit Network. It's made up of the heavy rail network which has been remarkably successful in terms of the number of public transport journeys growing over the last decade since the big investments and upgrades that started to be made in the Clark years and carried on through the last National Government. So there's a lot to celebrate with the success of rail in Auckland. We also have the Northern Busway which is rapid transit as well which is a massive success story. It's taken more than three lanes of traffic off the Harbour Bridge every morning and it's a great demonstration of how rapid transit alongside motorways and roads provides that dynamic flexibility that eases congestion.So our view is that the big challenge in Auckland—as well as actually in Wellington and the likes of Tauranga Hamilton and Christchurch—is to build rapid transit networks. In Auckland we think that the new lines that need to be built are city centre out to Māngere and the airport connecting the two biggest concentrations of jobs in the country. The purpose of that line is fundamentally not about getting people to catch a plane; it's about providing modern convenient rapid transit for people who need to commute for work or for education or community. There are other lines. From Auckland out to the high-growth corridor in the north-west is also important. The south-east—airport Manukau out to Botany and up into the south-east—also one of the poorest areas for public transport in the city. And of course an additional is a crossing that includes rapid transit and follows a rapid transit corridor up through the North Shore and up into the northern suburbs. In our view building that network is the priority really for the next 20 to 30 years of transport investment in Auckland.Why light rail? The answer is simply that when you're building a rapid transit network across an already built-up city light rail offers you far more flexibility than heavy rail does to move through heavily populated areas. Light rail includes a range of different possibilities in itself. You can have a surface-running streetcar model of light rail that many people will be familiar with from Melbourne right through to the light metro option which you can see in so many cities around the world like Paris London New York and others. So there are a number of different options. Light metro tends to have a completely segregated corridor so that it's not in the street competing with pedestrians and other traffic and that enables it to go faster. But that segregation then entails a higher level of engineering which could be going under being elevated or in some kind of separated or fenced corridor down the middle of the road for example.So it's been our view—and really building on the work that Auckland Transport and the other transport agencies did under the last National Government looking at that corridor from the city centre out to Mangere—that really agreed that that corridor was of urgent importance; that bus congestion on the isthmus was becoming a major problem and that has continued to be the case; and that light rail was the optimum mode for that. Since then as the member knows we've done a lot of work on that route looking at finance and governance options as well as whether or not it would be a streetcar model or a light metro option.I would finally say that it's been our view that the light metro option offers significant benefits because it enables you to move more people at speed. If we want to build a rapid transit network that can offer an option that rivals people riding in their private car on the motorway to get from one side of the city to the other speed and journey time become critically important. And the faster the journey is actually the higher the amenity benefits the more urban development that you're going to get around the stations and the greater mode shift you're going to achieve and the greater use by people of the system.