City seeks assurance on rail plan

The Hamilton City Council is seeking assurance from Environment Waikato that plans for a passenger rail service between Auckland and Hamilton are on track.

Following last week's regional transport committee meeting in Hamilton, Dave Macpherson, the Hamilton council's transport committee chairman, wrote to the regional council worried about the slowness of the process.

"I was pleased to see the report at the regional transport committee that Environment Waikato is about to commission some work to progress the proposal to establish a passenger rail service between Auckland and the Waikato, but disappointed that it has taken so long to get to this point," Mr Macpherson said in a letter to regional transport committee chairman Norm Barker.

"Of particular concern is that no provision appears to have been made by Environment Waikato in its submitted transport programmes to enable a service to be established within the next 10 years. This was not Hamilton City Council's expectation, considering the many discussions, studies and reports that both councils have been involved in during the last three years; and more particularly considering the Murray King report from late 2008 identifying the current opportunities for rolling stock that would not cost an arm and a leg."

The city council had made provision for a platform upgrade if needed and district councils such as Waipa, Waikato and Otorohanga were also interested in the proposal. Mr Macpherson said there was "a narrow window of opportunity" to get the idea moving with cheap rolling stock, access to Auckland's Britomart station and joint official group funding.

But Mr Barker said Environment Waikato was moving as quickly as it practically could to advance the idea of a passenger rail service between the two cities.

"We approached Tranz Scenic late last year about the idea of using the Silver Fern carriages. We reported back to the regional transport committee in December (and) we were told they would be available from July 2009 but that we would need to make a commitment six months in advance. That simply was not possible to do given the need to ensure a service was viable before we committed more funds, and time and effort, to it."

Mr Barker said since then they had been seeking answers from Tranz Scenic on whether they would be prepared to give them more time to make a commitment and provide details on likely costs but they had yet to receive a reply.

"Our current tack, as discussed at Monday's committee meeting, is to get Murray King to lead a study asap on whether it is worth committing the resources required to do a full business case investigation on an Auckland-Hamilton service."

- © Fairfax NZ News