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<[log in to unmask]> Date: Mon, 29
Mar 1999 18:18:06 -0800 Reply-To: Sierra Club Forum on Transportation
Issues
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<[log in to unmask]> From: John Holtzclaw
<[log in to unmask]> Subject: SYDNEY'S
OLYMPIC TRAFFIC CRISIS AND THE INGENIOUS SOLUTION To:
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NEAL PEIRCE COLUMN
For Release Sunday, March 28, 1999
Copyright 1999 Washington Post Writers Group
SYDNEY'S OLYMPIC TRAFFIC CRISIS--
AND THE INGENIOUS SOLUTION
By Neal R. Peirce
SYDNEY -- Built along the world's largest natural harbor, this lead city of
Australia shines by day and glitters by night over its 145 miles of harbors,
bays and coves. A storybook city for the 2000 Olympic games, one thinks.
But Sydney faces a towering traffic crisis. There's near gridlock as cars
and trucks jam the downtown and major arteries, including roadways to the
airport and Olympic Games site. Population has topped 4 million and car use is
expanding twice as fast. The region suffers from what the Sydney Herald labels
"bloated suburban mega-sprawl."
Could more roads help? Conceivably. But air pollution is worsening in a
region already exposed to harmful ultraviolet rays through its location on the
vast Antarctic-centered ozone hole. High melanoma rates and mounting incidences
of asthma among children are triggering concern. And the costs of vast new
freeways spanning the region's extensive network of waterways would be
prohibitive.
To that stew, add political fragmentation. The region is split among 54
independent cities and towns. Sydney city proper has a minuscule 28,000 people,
a recipe for political frailty.
None of this means Sydney can't and won't handle the Olympics well. It has
a magnificent CityRail system built earlier in the century -- 1,400 miles, 301
stations -- that moves 850,000 passengers a day. Indeed, Sydney's rails just
successfully transported 90 percent of a 103,000-person crowd to the first
ballgame at the spanking new Olympic Stadium.
An extension of the rail line to the airport is imminent. And when I asked
an official what would happen in already-clogged downtown Sydney when the world
comes to visit next year, he replied: "We'll just close the streets to
vehicles."
But what about the future -- a Sydney citistate transportation growth plan
for the coming decades? Is coherent action imaginable, given all those local
governments?
In the U.S., the answer might be "no." But not in Australia. And thereby
hangs Sydney's fascinating lesson for Americans. The state government of New
South Wales is galloping to the rescue.
It's put together an ambitious Action for Transport 2010 plan. It centers
on a $1 billion, 17-mile CityRail loop focused for the first time on on
suburb-to-suburb service, but linked to the radial lines that lead out from
downtown.
Emulating Pittsburgh and Ottawa, the new plan will also pump $500 million
into construction of seven "bus-only" transitways, 65 miles in length. Buses
can travel normal local streets, then channel onto the exclusive busways. "We
considered light rail but opted for the busways realizing we could afford to do
that in 3.5 years, compared to 20 years for light rail," explains Jock Murray,
director-general of the New South Wales Transportation Department.
The 2010 plan has complementary highway elements -- a motor tunnel under
downtown, to divert traffic from city streets.
But its heart are new transportation choices to reduce escalating auto use,
cut pollution, and create a more livable environment. Major investment, for
example, goes into upgrading the region's extensive passenger ferry system.
There'll be integrated ticketing and real-time electronic timetables displayed
at all rail, bus and ferry stops. New bike and pedestrian paths will parallel
the new transit routes.
Sydney has a transportation infrastructure plan that "puts ours to shame,"
said Seattle Mayor Paul Schell, accompanying the a 90-person Seattle Chamber of
Commerce Study Mission earlier this month.
Yet there's more to the plan than hardware. New South Wales will push
denser land use, especially near major stops. It will provide urban design
assistance for localities. It will expand parks and city green spaces, and
insist on "inclusionary zoning" to achieve an income mix in new real estate
developments.
So how can a state government do all this? Why doesn't it bend to the will
of localities that want to build and develop their way, with little regard to
the regional welfare?
The answer: Australia's parliamentary political system. The executive and
legislature function as one. A state's premier and "the government" he forms
can force any change they like. And if some locality stands in their path, they
simply overrule it. Indeed, unruly local councils often get suspended.
You can say that defies local sentiment, what we Americans call "home
rule." But it means the 2010 transport plan isn't just talk. Barring a
political upheaval, it will happen.
New South Wales has also shown it's serious by combining once-warring road
and public transit ministries and budgeting for transportation improvements for
a full decade ahead.
The goal isn't just livability, or quality of life in the Sydney region.
It's necessary, says Murray, "to enhance Sydney's competitiveness in the global
economy. Manageable density has to be the wave of the future for world cities."
Can we imagine American states, with New South Wales' vigor and wisdom,
taking responsibility to make their own citistates livable, viable, competitive?
In the 21st century, nothing less may do.
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