Heather du Plessis-Allan: Good riddance to the Auckland Regional Fuel Tax

It's official, the Auckland Regional Fuel Tax is gone-burger from 1 July.

Aucklanders will not have to pay $11.5 cents a litre more everyone else in the country every time they fill up their cars. Toyota Hilux drivers will save $9.20 a fill and Toyota Corolla drivers will save $5.75 a fill.

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

That was a rort, wasn’t it? Remember what Auckland was supposed to get for that?

We were supposed to get upgrades to Mill Road, the road I'm obsessed with because of how desperately the city needs it- running from Manukau down to Drury as an alternative to the jam-packed Southern Motorway.

Did we get it? We paid for it for six years.

Did we get it? No, of course we didn't.

Did we get the Lake Road upgrade we’ve been talking about since at least 2017? No, we didn't get that.

Did we get the Glenvar Road upgrade we’ve been talking about since at 2016? No, we didn't get that. And the list goes on.

Instead, the money got used for cycle lanes and speed humps. And do I need to remind you about those speed humps?

How about the one got laid in Three Kings, then got ripped up two years later and laid again because AT stuffed up- and it cost us $600k? How about that one?

Mayor Wayne Brown is not happy about the loss of funding. He's released a list of projects at the end of a press release, with no explanation for the list.

The inference, I'm thinking, is that these are the projects that are going to get cut, because they haven't got the funding.

Let me list some:

• Mangere West cycleway.
• Road safety programme, including high-risk intersections.
• The safe speeds programme, aimed at reducing vehicle speeds near schools.
• Small scale projects to improve local cycling connections.
• New low cost cycle ways to improve safety and travel options.
• Upgrades to multi-modes roads, paths, and intersections to support Kainga Ora.

I doubt very much that many Aucklanders are going to cry tears over this because of one reason.

We have paid this under the mistaken belief that we were paying for better roads. What we got instead was AT squandering money on their own inability to just construct a basic pedestrian crossing.

But more importantly, what we got was a city that is now more congested and harder to drive around.

So as far as I can see, very little has improved for what we've paid, and much of what we're seeing is worse.

I'm happy to defund Auckland Transport.

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