Engineers wary of proposal

Press, 13 April 1978, Page 18

Engineers wary of proposal

PA Wellington Proposals for setting up authorities with power onlyji in the public passenger, transport field would cut: across the work already I being done in co-ordinating ,1 urban transport, according I 1 to the national council of' 1 the Institute of Engineers. The council said in a statement that it was en- ’ dorsing a submission made ' by the institute’s trans- 1 portation and traffic engineering group to the official 1 Committee on Transport, in response to a governmental ’ discussion paper, “Urban I Transport in New Zealand." The council said co-ordi-nation with public transport policies had already been achieved in the five main | centres. If changes were to be made in urban transport or-1 ganisation, the trans-. portation group considered that it should be borne in I mind that, at both national 1 and regional levels, transport was only part of the function of regional planning. Public passenger trans-

port, in its turn, was only; part of transportation, the j group said. The group believed it . was more logical to esI tablish a new body taking in some of the functions of the i National Roads Board, the 'Railways, and the urban public transportation authority rather than to establish a body primarily responsible for public passenger transport. This would be particularly relevant if the new body was under a separate Ministry to the one responsible for land use planning. The group said that proposals for reform of urban transport should not weaken or destroy the long-standing and close relationships that : exist between land use plan-; ning and transportation; (planning in the main cenitres. At the local level, the | group believed the regional [ councils proposed by the Local Government Commission were the most logical new organisations to provide co-ordination with the necessary responsibility.