Fitzsimons Jeanette: Road Traffic Reduction Bill — Second Reading 
Fitzsimons Jeanette: Road Traffic Reduction Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:615;Page:11134] 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 I move  
That the Road Traffic Reduction Bill be now read a second time 
. I strongly support the recommendation of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee that the Road Traffic Reduction Bill not proceed because the bill has served its purpose. I am very happy at the extent to which its provisions have been incorporated or improved in the Land Transport Management Act passed last November. However I have moved that the bill be read a second time because the House needs the opportunity to debate what has happened to it and how its provisions are already having an effect. 
I remind the House that the bill was drafted in the year 2000 drawn from the ballot in May 2001 and had its first reading only in December 2002—the same week by coincidence that the Land Transport Management Bill was also read a first time. In the intervening period the Greens and the Government had worked together on the latter bill and incorporated into it many of the features of my own bill. Those that were not incorporated into the bill as introduced were added by the select committee considering the two bills together and I thank it for that. 
The purpose of the bill as stated is to provide for regional councils and the Minister of Transport to put in place measures to reduce motorised traffic and thereby enhance environmental quality and the health safety and well-being of people and communities. That purpose has been largely addressed in the new legislation. I do not need to remind the House of the economic social and environmental damage done by congestion crashes air pollution high and growing fuel use severance of communities and risks to children pedestrians and cyclists of our previous transport policies which were focused solely on encasing everything that needs to move inside a tonne of metal and putting it all on the same congested roads. That policy is now changed and it is providing for a multimodal integrated intelligent-mix of solutions. 
The bill provides in clause 6 for the national land transport strategy already mandated by the 1998 Act to provide for the reduction of motorised traffic. There has been no national strategy in the statutory sense for some years and there still is none. Frankly I think there should be. But what we do have now is the New Zealand transport strategy developed by the Government in partnership with the Greens. It sets a broader range of economic social and environmental goals for land transport. It covers all modes and it states that sustainability is paramount. This was a huge change of direction. 
I still hope that one day that strategy may evolve into the statutory strategy provided for in the 1998 Act and thereby acquire mandatory force. At present it is being used to guide transport developments so it is having an effect anyway. That change of direction is reflected in the purpose of the new Act which is an integrated safe responsive and sustainable land transport system. Section 12 of the Act now requires land transport programmes at the regional and national levels to assist economic development assist safety and personal security improve access and mobility protect and promote public health and ensure environmental sustainability. 
Part 2 of my bill widens the mandate of Transfund New Zealand to provide funding for all modes of land transport so that it can fund rail and public transport as well as roads. It also requires Transit New Zealand to avoid significant or irreversible destruction to the environment existing communities and historic heritage when building its roads. Those matters are now provided for in sections 68 and 77 and schedule 6 of the Act. I look forward to an end to the cowboy behaviour that has sometimes bulldozed through sensitive wetlands poured spoil into coastal areas failed to track sediment from roadworks and generally failed to respect the environment through which roads must pass. That behaviour is no longer tolerated in Europe and it is good that from now on it will not be tolerated here either. 
Clause 7 of my bill requires Transfund and Transit to provide for the targets timetables and measures for the reduction of motorised traffic that are set out in the strategy. The language to express that idea has changed in the new Act and we now talk of “traffic demand management” rather than “road traffic reduction”. The meaning is exactly the same but it seems that we have hit on wording that people understand rather better. Maybe we will not get so many silly jokes about skateboards now. 
Schedule 6 of the Act requires regional land transport strategies to include demand management strategies and to have targets timetables and measures to implement those strategies. That was added by the select committee and supported by the House as a way of incorporating the intent of the Road Traffic Reduction Bill and I thank members for their support for those provisions. 
The new Act is already working and I have been delighted at the speed with which the language of transport planning has changed. There are real gains on the ground especially in Auckland where the most serious problems are. Although it will take a few years to undo the neglect of the past we are already seeing a 25 percent increase in passengers on public transport and an almost doubling of funding for passenger transport operations. The rail track has been brought back under public control which the Greens called for 3 years ago and it will be maintained and used to keep heavy freight and commuters off the roads. 
As the Minister said in the  
New Zealand Herald  
just last week: “We cannot simply motorway our way out of congestion. Congestion will only be cleared with a balanced approach involving all transport modes. Demand management is widely accepted in most OECD countries as a valid form of transport planning. Traffic demand management is about using existing roads more sensibly.” Those are wise statements by the Minister and I endorse them. 
We are seeing local government pick up and run with this part of the new Act and there are some exciting developments in North Shore City. The council there has employed six new school transport coordinators to work with schools families and trust boards to find alternative travel plans for pupils whose parents currently drive them to school. To make it easier for them to walk and cycle the council is looking at new pedestrian crossings safe cycle paths secure lockers and bike parking and supervised walking school buses. 
 The Auckland Regional Council says that already there are noticeable results. With that programme in place the children are fitter the air is cleaner parents have more free time traffic flows more freely and there is less congestion. We know that some 40 percent of peak-hour congestion is education-related. If we could even halve that through targeted school travel plans a lot of the worst congestion in Auckland would simply disappear. 
The Greens have a basic principle of doing more with less for longer of making better use of what we already have and of cutting out waste. We have contributed to that goal for energy with my Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act that was passed in 2000. We are proud to have done it for transport too with our cooperation agreement with the Government over the Land Transport Management Bill and with the trigger that this member’s bill has provided in the select committee. 
I thank the Minister for the work that we have done together and I thank Helen Duncan for her able and sympathetic chairing of the select committee. The Road Traffic Reduction Bill has served its purpose and I farewell it happily. RIP.