Prime minister John Key’s push for the first stage of construction for the East-West Link to be completed as soon as possible is welcoming news to the head of the Auckland chamber of commerce, Micheal Barnett.
Barnett is responding to comments made by the prime minister at yesterday’s ceremony in Onehunga marking the start of work to widen State Highway 20 between Neilson St and Queenstown Rd, which was also attended by transport minister Simon Bridges.
During the ceremony Key said that Auckland would continue to grow at a fast pace and would need the infrastructure, urging minister Bridges to encourage completion of the stage one project and move forward on the bigger project as soon as possible
“The prime minister’s comments give confidence to the business community to seek accelerated action to implement Auckland’s priority projects unveiled recently by the Auckland Transport Alignment Project,” says Barnett.
“It sends a signal that Auckland needs to accelerate action to deal with our major transport problems and cope with the city’s significant population growth projected to continue for the foreseeable future,” says Barnett.
Barnett says Auckland’s vehicle fleet is increasing by around 900 new cars and trucks every week, its economy is growing at more than 3% a year, and its private sector is driving investment and keen to take up more opportunities – but that congestion is increasing.
