Politics of Auckland transport under spotlight

A Massey researcher is investigating how local and central governments and communities can work together to build a better urban public transport system in Auckland.

Dr Imran Muhammad has won a $345,000 a Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fast-Start grant for the three-year project on the politics of Auckland transport.

He will study the planning and policy of public transport through an analysis of socio-political institutions in Auckland. “Public transport in Auckland is topical, controversial and highly politicised,” Dr Muhammad says. “The failure to provide a high quality public transport system in the city has its origins in institutional challenges.”

“This project will take a new institutional approach, linking the planning and design of public transport with analysis of how social and political relationships between local and central government affect the transport decisions that are made.”

Dr Muhammad says the city’s transport system has geographical and historical political challenges, including conflicting priorities at central and local government levels, differing political ideologies on transport strategies and funding systems and limited opportunities for genuine public involvement.

“These challenges demand not merely incremental change but transformative change – a change in policy path.”

His study will focus on whether the recent institutional change in Auckland reveals anything about how more extensive change might be made within the system itself. It will also investigate public transport decision and policy-making, explore communities’ involvement and aspirations, examine existing and alternative beliefs in public transport planning and engage with key stakeholders.

He believes that while ambitious planning documents, political decisions and restructuring of local organisations have a place in developing public transport, quality democratic deliberations and the institutional capacity to redefine the problem and generate new solutions are more important.

Dr Muhammad, a senior lecturer at Massey’s School of People, Environment and Planning, says compared to overseas cities, particularly Perth and Vancouver, Auckland’s transport systems have lagged behind. “Auckland has a long way to go, and in terms of economic efficiency, environmental sustainability and social equity, there is a real need for good quality public transport.”

He believes the time is right for the study, and to explore how local and central governments can work together. “It is a unique time in the history of Auckland, governance has changed and the political will is there to improve, and transform, public transport in the city.”