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Illustration showing roading around the Basin Reserve, no longer to be the Southern Hemisphere’s largest roundabout. (Photo: Supplied / LGWM)
Illustration showing roading around the Basin Reserve, no longer to be the Southern Hemisphere’s largest roundabout. (Photo: Supplied / LGWM)

The BulletinJune 30, 2022

Getting Wellington moving

Illustration showing roading around the Basin Reserve, no longer to be the Southern Hemisphere’s largest roundabout. (Photo: Supplied / LGWM)
Illustration showing roading around the Basin Reserve, no longer to be the Southern Hemisphere’s largest roundabout. (Photo: Supplied / LGWM)

Announced as a once-in-generation opportunity, the long-awaited Let’s get Wellington moving plan prompts a range of reactions, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in The Bulletin.

 

“Once-in-a-generation opportunity”

I am in the capital this fine morning so thought I would take a look at the plan to get Wellington moving. I absolutely will not gripe about the airport bus situation which I believe is due to be rectified from tomorrow. Yesterday the government announced its preferred plan for the overhaul of how Wellingtonians get around. It was billed as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape Wellington’s future by finance and infrastructure minister, Grant Robertson. The government has backed light rail from the city to Island Bay and a new tunnel through Mt Victoria. Overall, the plan is estimated to cost $7.6b and slated for completion in the 2030s. Wellington city council and Greater Wellington regional council now have to choose their preferred option before more detailed planning can begin.

Mode shift

Wellingtonians have waited a long time for this. Let’s get Wellington moving is a joint initiative created in 2015 involving Wellington city council, Greater Wellington regional council and Waka Kotahi NZ transport agency. It hit problems along the way, with the project deemed at risk of failure in March last year. Stuff’s Kate Green has written this very good overview of the initiative. The project’s main aim is mode shift – getting people cycling, walking and taking public transport. The Dominion Post has been championing and explaining the concept with a regular series. You can read editor Anna Fifield’s introduction here.

So what’s been the reaction?

So far, from local and central government figures, I’d go with unsurprisingly “mixed”. Stuff’s Luke Malpass describes the arguments for and against as a retreat into various ideological silos. Mayor Andy Foster applauded the announcement as a “massive” day for the capital. The Dominion Post is running that line on the front page of the paper this morning. The Green party welcomed portions of it but transport spokesperson Julie Anne Genter said the government’s preferred option is “not the best for the climate overall” citing the tunnels as “high-carbon and high-cost”. As RNZ’s Kirsty Frame reports, the government is yet to complete an assessment of the climate implications of the policy. National MP Nicola Willis criticised the announcement for being just that, an announcement, saying it was hard to get excited because as yet there was no business case, no funding agreement and no plan to start construction until 2028.

New contender for largest roundabout in Southern hemisphere?

Naturally the first question we had in the Spinoff office was “will people still toot in the new tunnel?” The old Mt Victoria tunnel would be converted into a walking and cycling-only route according to the plan. I recently drove to Wellington airport in torrential rain and observed the bottleneck the current Mt Victoria tunnel creates, barely squeaking onto the plane in time. The proposed second tunnel will have four lanes – one lane each way for public transport and one for private vehicles. There are also proposed changes to roading around the Basin Reserve, meaning there will be a new contender for the title of largest roundabout in the Southern hemisphere. Bit of a throwback but in 2013, the roundabout caught the eye of the United Kingdom roundabout appreciation society and it featured the Basin Reserve in a roundabouts of the world calendar. The National library has a copy.

Keep going!
Police rely on Drug Foundation to donate Naloxone, a treatment that reverses an opioid overdose (Image: Mark Oniffrey CC-BY-SA-4.0)
Police rely on Drug Foundation to donate Naloxone, a treatment that reverses an opioid overdose (Image: Mark Oniffrey CC-BY-SA-4.0)

The BulletinJune 29, 2022

Is our approach to drugs fit to deal with fentanyl?

Police rely on Drug Foundation to donate Naloxone, a treatment that reverses an opioid overdose (Image: Mark Oniffrey CC-BY-SA-4.0)
Police rely on Drug Foundation to donate Naloxone, a treatment that reverses an opioid overdose (Image: Mark Oniffrey CC-BY-SA-4.0)

Experts are concerned about our preparedness to cope with a fentanyl outbreak and say part of the problem is our drug law, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell on The Bulletin.

 

68% of New Zealanders support a rewrite of the Misuse of Drugs Act 

In 2020 I took a paper on alcohol, drugs and addiction. A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing but it did give me some understanding of why the Misuse of Drugs Act is called a Frankenstein by those advocating for an overhaul of our drug laws. Today on The Spinoff, Duncan Grieve joins this call, writing “unless we want to end up with the breaking wave upon wave of entirely avoidable tragedy seen in the US, it’s time for this country to leave its drug laws in the 70s and build something fit for the 2020s.” A poll released by the Drug Foundation over the weekend found 68% of New Zealanders agree with him.

Concerns raised after fentanyl overdoses

Grieve has written his piece today in response to the news that powdered fentanyl has been detected in New Zealand. 12 people were hospitalised in Wairarapa after taking what they thought was cocaine and methamphetamine. Fentayl is a highly dangerous synthetic opioid. If you are familiar with Empire of Pain (a 2021 book by Patrick Radden Keefe) or DopeSick (the TV series based on the book of the same name by Beth Macy) you will know something about the opioid crisis in the US. 60,000 people lost their lives to fentanyl overdoses in the US last year.

New Zealand “grossly underprepared” for a fentanyl outbreak

Sarah Helm, executive director of the Drug Foundation, says we are grossly underprepared for a fentanyl outbreak. Helm’s concern is two-fold. She is concerned about access to harm reduction services and treatments. Police don’t have their own supply of Naloxone, a treatment that reverses an opioid overdose, and rely on kits donated by the Drug Foundation. Secondly, she says, based on what’s happened in the US, overdoses are amplified by “a mess of a drug law”. This article on The Conversation walks through the international evidence around drug policy and rates of drug harm. Fentanyl was reclassified in May under the Misuse of Drugs Act. At the time, Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick took the opportunity in the house to argue, once again, that our drug laws need replacing.

A long line of reviews

For one of my uni assignments, I wrote a hubristic faux briefing to the incoming health minister. No one, let alone the health minister, should read it but there is one line I am OK with repeating: “For as long as the Misuse of Drugs Act is the dominant legislative lens through which we view drug use, we will continue to fail at treating it as a health issue.” Undergraduate pontifications aside, that is also in line with findings from the Law Commission in 2010, the He Ara Oranga Government Inquiry into Mental Health and Addiction in 2018 and global bodies advising on drug policy. Despite an open letter from the Medical Association, the Public Health Association and the Mental Health Foundation, when asked about drug law reform in 2021, health minister Andrew Little said it was off the cards. For now. With 68% of people saying they want to see reform and the inadequate framework we have to deal with the effects of a drug like fentanyl in New Zealand, now-ish might be good.