Passenger Rail 2023-6, and beyond. Is it all doom & gloom?

Following the recent election result, several rail supporters have gone online to express doom and gloom in respect of passenger rail in New Zealand. The thrust of their arguments are that since National and ACT are, in one commentator’s words “wilfully anti rail”, we will not only make no passenger rail advances, but likely go backwards.

I have a different view – not that I don’t recognize the difficulties various stated positions of the incoming Government represent, but that there

• Are quite a number of passenger rail initiatives already on the go

• Is significant support for passenger rail in the community

• Are realistic opportunities for further passenger rail initiatives

• Is a real need to address climate change – how rail can contribute to this in New Zealand

I’m no rail, or transport engineer, and can’t give you the technical specifications for a workable passenger rail service (although there are plenty around who can); but I have worked for over two decades in the public transport policy and implementation areas, as an advocate and champion for passenger rail and mass transport services, and their integration with our daily lives, and have experience in getting transport initiatives through bureaucracies and political systems.

This experience tells me that – no matter what rash and maybe objectionable statements of position have been made during election campaigns – there will be opportunities and angles arising over the next 3 years and more that will help get New Zealand further along the path towards the restoration of inter-regional and local passenger rail services.

It will be up to communities, working with local and national rail advocacy groups, to make good use of those opportunities.

To give readers some idea of what underpins my view, here are some more specific points:

Passenger rail initiatives already on the go

• The announcement in September 2023 by the Government, and Horizons & Greater Wellington Regional Councils (GWRC) that 18 ‘four-car, tri-mode hybrid trains’ will be purchased for use for the Capital Connection and Wairarapa Connection passenger services, which will quadruple services from Palmerston North and double peak services from Masterton, to Wellington. The trains will use electrified lines for part of the journey, and run on batteries through to their final destinations, replacing diesel locomotives-run services, and will be in place in about 5 years.

• The announcement by Waikato Regional Council (WRC) in October 2023 that the Te Huia (Hamilton-Auckland) passenger service will at least see its ‘trial’ through five years until 2026 (note: the next election year), and will from February 2024 be expanding to include 3rd return services on Thursdays and Fridays, and an extra Saturday return service. In addition, WRC is formally considering a case to purchase the same hybrid train systems as in a. above, which may allow Te Huia access into Britomart station, the preferred Auckland CBD terminating station. New stations are also being now formally considered in conjunction with Waikato District Council, at Pokeno, Te Kauwhata and Tuakau.

• The underground City Rail Loop (CRL) in Auckland, due for completion in late 2025. NZ’s biggest transport infrastructure project, it allows huge capacity increases on the AT Metro passenger rail services citywide, potentially also enabling more slots for inter-regional rail.

• Wellington Metlink service – KiwiRail and GWRC have recently completed a series of efficiency upgrades to enable greater capacity.

• A recommendation by the Parliamentary Select Committee to consider a passenger rail service from Tauranga to Auckland (via Hamilton

• Dunedin Railways – the city council-owned tourist train expanding its offering, including a regular (although not very frequent) link with Oamaru and connections for cruise ship passengers, developing a strategic and operational link with the experienced Glenbrook Vintage Rail company.

• The North Island Regional Passenger Rail Connector study, fronted by local authorities in the central North Island, looking at a passenger rail connection between existing Hamilton and Palmerston North services. In addition, Taumarunui has recently been restored as a stop for the Northern Explorer train.

Support for passenger rail in the community

• Formed in 2022, Save our Trains/The Future is Rail is a nationwide network of individuals and groups working in the passenger rail advocacy and transport consultancy areas. https://www.facebook.com/groups/sotnz/

• Save our Trains/The Future is Rail has convened numerous well-attended public meetings to promote passenger rail and hear issues raised by local people up and down both Islands, with more to come – building an extensive mailing list and potential activist base, which is already being drawn on for the establishment of local pro-passenger rail groups.

• Although not everyone’s cup of tea, an activist group ‘Restore Passenger Rail’ has taken several ‘direct actions’ in the last year – mainly in Wellington – which have highlighted the lack of passenger rail services in New Zealand.

• As an example of the local support for passenger rail, a professional opinion survey was conducted in 2011 by the Waikato Times newspaper in and around Hamilton as to the support for a passenger rail service from Hamilton-Auckland – responses showed over 70% community support for what has now become the Te Huia service. It is not a stretch to imagine that most regional centres in this country would return a similar result if such a survey was held in their areas.

Opportunities for further passenger rail initiatives

• Tauranga–Auckland link being actively promoted by experienced advocacy groups Making Rail Work, and The Rail Opportunities Network, likely added on to the current Te Huia service currently ending in Hamilton.

• Southerner – considering the possibility of restoring a passenger link between Dunedin and Christchurch (with a possible extension to Invercargill, and stops in towns like Oamaru, Timaru and Ashburton, perhaps targeting tertiary students for start and end of term journeys to start with.

• Napier-Wellington service, which was strongly backed by recent Save Our Trains public meetings in the Hawkes Bay.

• Northland passenger rail and railfreight links with Auckland have long been called for by local government & the business community, and are now a policy of the New Zealand First party – with a strong Northland link, and likely to be a partner in the incoming Government.

• Christchurch suburban rail service, perhaps linking Rolleston to the south and Kaiapoi and Rangiora to the north, with Christchurch central.

• Renewal of the Auckland metro line north-west to Kumeu and Helensville, as settlement increases in that corridor, and demands for transit services increase.

• An extension of Wellington’s Metlink services to the northern suburbs of Upper Hutt.

• Extension north of the Capital Connection service to Whanganui.

• The current crop of KiwiRail tourist trains having their ‘brief’ or ‘mission’ expanded to include a secondary target of local inter-regional services.

The need to address climate change – how rail can contribute to this in New Zealand

• Without going into great technical detail, it clear that passenger rail can release far lower CO2 emissions than air travel, or petrol/diesel road transport.

• Dr Duncan Connors, Senior Lecturer at Otago University’s Business School, has estimated air travel between Dunedin and Christchurch as releasing seven times the emissions as passenger rail would (https://www.odt.co.nz/news/the-south-today/christchurch-train-service-mooted-students)

• The International Energy Agency (IEA) has assessed that relativity as about five times (https://www.iea.org/energy-system/transport/rail)

• The Otago Regional Council’s 2021 ‘Greenhouse Gas Profile’ says “Transport was the biggest emission source in the Queenstown Lakes district and a significant source in Dunedin”. Most other parts of New Zealand have similar emissions profiles.

• The Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) – which the incoming National Government says it supports – calls for reducing CO2 emissions by 35% by 2035, and sets a long term reduction pathway through to 2050.

• The arguments – again according to the incoming Government – are over the methods used to achieve that, not the end targets.

• So, short of banning all cows – which the new Government says is unfair on the agriculture sector, or increasing our ‘clean electricity’ production up to 100% via a Lake Onslow-type battery storage system (which again National says it will axe) – it is clear that reducing transport-generated emissions will have to play a very large part in order for New Zealand to come anywhere near meeting its targets.

• Slowly raising the percentage of EVs, or even increasing the number of charging stations is not going to, by itself, cut the mustard in terms of meeting emission reduction targets. Nor is asking the private sector to build more wind generators and other small scale renewable energy sources. Nor even by itself are significant increases in the uptake of public transport, including the restoration and establishment of inter-regional and local passenger rail services.

• The truth is that all of these measures, and more, will need to be enacted to make a decent dent in the ERP targets, and the more sensible heads in the incoming Government will know this, or at least be quickly advised of the need to step out of election slogan mode into a governance mode.

So, while I’m not blind to the difficulties we’ll have in the next few years in promoting passenger rail initiatives, I can see that well-supported, and especially localised, passenger rail initiatives will be potentially attractive to a centre right Government keen to demonstrate it does have some climate change credentials.

The likely involvement of New Zealand First in the Government will also mean that some (hopefully more than just Northland) initiatives will have some support within the Government.

It will be up to the passenger rail advocacy groups, and supportive parties like local and regional government bodies to clearly express the need for specific projects, and demonstrate a high degree of community support for them in order to, as at least one Party said in the recent election campaign, “Get New Zealand back on Track”.

Blog by Dave Macpherson, former Hamilton City Councillor & Te Huia establishment activist; now involved in Save Our Trains Otepoti-Dunedin.