Cycling infrastructure is much cheaper than car infrastructure. Way less material needed (narrower paths, less foundation) and much lower maintenance costs.
Initial investment per cyclist might seem high, but you need to build it before they come. And they come. Just look at Amsterdam (became a cycling city in the 70s) or Paris (started investing heavily in cycling infra a little less than 10 years ago).
"The $290m 16-kilometre Northern Corridor motorway extension, funded by the government, cost $18m a kilometre to build, while the second stage of the southern motorway worked out at $20m per kilometre." says https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/124611551/building-10...
In the US it costs about US (20230) $4 million/mile to put in a new small urban road. https://kobobuilding.com/cost-to-build-a-road-per-mile/ . That's about NZ$4 million/km, if I did the conversion correctly, and still more than the bike path.
Arguing that roads are more expensive is roger irrelevant.
> 10x more expensive than this bike path.
And faaar less than 1/10th of trips goes to bike paths. Cost per actual trip is what matters. What I see is a few busy bike lanes (say city centre). And some virtually unused bikelanes e.g. there are very nice expensive cycle lanes next to the Southern Motorway - but their cost per trip is surely much much higher than the cost of the Motorway per trip costs. I.e. your argument isn't just wrong, it's likely wrong in the wrong direction.
And some of that expensive road costs are for cyclists e.g. a costly ROAD intersection designed for bikes (near a university). The new redesign to fix the cockup is more $$$. One intersection - and designing for bikes was the cause for the costs (the externalities were also high). https://i.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/123202841/traffic-light...
Cyclelanes get road barriers e.g. road to Lyttelton has a new one. Fairly accounting for costs added to roads matters.
> NZ$317
Aaaaand just where do you think those government taxes come from eh? You are trying to imply that the difference between $750 and $317 is free money not paid for by Christchurch tax payers.
My bigger point is that the reality needs to be rationally acknowledged. Ignoring usage is putting head in sand.
It's also incorrect to compare this bike path, which seems to be more expensive than most, to the average road cost. I quoted several road projects which were much more expensive than average.
Is the average comparison price comparison more like 30x? If so, that's what you would expect for 3% of the population, yes?
> Cost per actual trip is what matters.
Then work out and present the numbers, rather than feelings.
Every person biking is a car off the road, and the car on the road requires a LOT more space than a bike. Bikes also take far less space to store, so you don't need a much space dedicated to parking instead of housing or businesses.
Your secondary effects should include reduced pollution (EVs don't have exhaust, but still release tire/brake particulates) and improved general health (by people biking instead of driving).
Try digging up the planning study which justified this work, and see what it reports. That should include the "rationally acknowledged" details you seek.
> You are trying to imply that the difference between $750 and $317 is free money not paid for by Christchurch tax payers.
No, I was pointing out that your math - "that is $750 per person" - is wrong. If that simple calculation is wrong, how well can you/I trust your analysis?
Roads are mostly paid for by car users - so their relative expense is fucking irrelevant.
It is perfectly valid to complain about the costs of cycle lanes when they are being paid for by people that are not using them. Sure non-cyclists do get some benefits - but nowhere near the amount that non-cyclists are paying.
I couldn't find any figures on cross-regional tax imbalances. But as a first estimate I think it is fair to assume Christchurch government taxes are approximately the same as government expenditure on Christchurch. Not quite right e.g. we hear a lot of complaints that Auckland roading infrastructure is subsidised by the rest of the country.
I'm only quoting public info - this is not an area I care that much about. I'm just interested in some estimates given the issues I perceive around the city.
> The government money for the cycle lanes comes mostly from car and fuel taxes:
My experience from the US is no doubt leading me astray.
However, you have mischaracterized your source. It says "Revenue in the NLTF comes from two main sources – fuel taxes and road user charges."
The entry for "Road user charges (net)" says "$6 billion End customers of freight carriers in the prices paid for goods and services. Light diesel vehicle owner payments."
It does not give a breakdown for just cars, and even people without a car pay for goods and services which are transported over roads.
Furthermore, the National Land Transport Fund is not the only organization which funds roads. It took a while to find it, but I see that "Council receive Transport related revenue from several operating streams. These are rates, borrowing and the National
Land Transport Fund (NLTF) subsidy, via the National Land Transport Programme (NLTP) which Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency administer on behalf of the Government." at https://ccc.govt.nz/assets/Documents/The-Council/Plans-Strat... .
You therefore need to include rates and borrowing into the total budget sources.
According to https://www.nzta.govt.nz/planning-and-investment/national-la... , for example, the "Total for Canterbury › Christchurch City Council › Local road maintenance" for the "The total cost of the activity’s phase for all years, including local share" is NZ$ 548,783.1 while the NLTF funding is 32,772.9+35,390.3+40,024.8 = 108,188 or less than 20% of the total cost - if I understand it correctly.
If I understand "Total for Canterbury › Christchurch City Council › Local road improvements" correctly, under 10% is from NLTF funding.
That sure seems like far less than half the funding for roads in Christchurch come from car and fuel taxes.
Can you find a better breakdown?
Lastly, look at the breakdown of NLTP funding. "In 2021–24, $24.3 billion of funding is forecast to be managed under the NLTP" of which $910m is "to walking and cycling improvements".
That is 3.7% for walking and cycling.
You wrote that in Christchurch "3% of trips are by bicycle".
> and even people without a car pay for goods and services which are transported over roads.
Only partially. About 750000 personal light vehicles below 3500kg pay RUC charges - a lot of that is deisel personal vehicles - 4WDs etcetera. Looks like they pay about 40% of total RUC revenue. The RUC revenue for heavy vehicles is supposed to be assigned to road costs caused by heavy vehicles. RUC = road user charges. The fact they are paying for cyclists is really against the stated purpose of the RUC.
Note that the new National government intends to introduce RUC for electric vehicles since those use roads but are not paying their fair share of costs.
For 2020/21 common costs are forecast to be $4.49 billion, less fixed revenue of $1.55 billion made up of ratepayer funding, motor vehicle registration and licensing fees and other Crown revenue, which leaves almost $3 billion of common costs to be recovered from RUC and PED.
That implies council rates pay about 1/3 of costs which is a similar ratio to your earlier calcs. Hard to calculate better because a lot of the common costs are towards national infrastructure rather than local.
> Looks like they pay about 40% of total RUC revenue.
So the other 60% is paid by people wanting goods and services, even if they themselves don't have a car?
> About 750000 personal light vehicles below 3500kg pay RUC charges - a lot of that is deisel personal vehicles
Yes, because your source says petrol vehicles pay fuel excise directly. It also points out "Unlike Europe, there are relatively few diesel passenger cars in New
Zealand, which may be a reflection of effects of having to pay RUC."
Where is the excise tax going?
I see motorcycles don't pay an RUC. I assume because they are all petrol.
> The RUC revenue for heavy vehicles is supposed to be assigned to road costs caused by heavy vehicles.
Yes, your source says: "Heavy vehicles pay substantially more than light vehicles, largely because the CAM includes an exponential calculation for the road wear component but also reflecting the need they create for stronger bridges and other structures, and the additional road space they occupy."
and "The weight related damage costs are allocated according to the so called “4th power rule”. This is written as ESA = (laden weight/axle factor)^4 x load factor x number of axles. The “4th power rule” is based on historical research from the USA, South Africa and NZ, and is widely accepted as a rule of thumb for road design."
A bicycle of 120 kg (including rider) has 1/10th the laden weight of a vehicle so the ESA should be about 1/10,000 th as much. In practice the exponential doesn't work that way ("Vehicles weighing less than around 6 tonnes do almost no damage to roads") but the point stands that bicycle roads are significantly cheaper to build and maintain than ones handling cars.
A bicycle takes at most 1/5th space as a car, so the space related costs should also be much smaller.
I don't know about NZ but in the US bicycles are generally prohibited from highways, which are also more expensive to build than city streets.
> That implies council rates pay about 1/3 of costs which is a similar ratio to your earlier calcs.
My earlier calcs had the NLTF paying under 1/3 of the costs for city roads in Christchurch the rest by other ratepayers and other sources.
> Hard to calculate better because a lot of the common costs are towards national infrastructure rather than local.
Yes, that is why I don't think looking at NLTF numbers gives a good idea of who pays what for the roads in Christchurch.
It still doesn't seem that the money spent on the new 101 km of bike paths is all that outrageous, given that it seems proportionate to the number of users or predicted users.
The points I made are just as relevant to "cheaper". costs/benefits need to be compared against population usage. You are not arguing against the data I gave.
If you build cycling infrastructure, you get more cyclists. 'Build it and they will come' turned out to be true in the examples I gave (and there are many other examples out there).
The question is if you want increase that 3%. For me it's a no-brainer, given the benefits.
Initial investment per cyclist might seem high, but you need to build it before they come. And they come. Just look at Amsterdam (became a cycling city in the 70s) or Paris (started investing heavily in cycling infra a little less than 10 years ago).