Post in Peak Oil and implications for Christchurch

2007 Jul 11 23:44 UTC

Buck, Sally wrote:
> The biggest impact of peak oil will be transportation of people and
> freight.
> For moving people around we need to make sure that public transport is
> fast, efficient and cost effective for the user. I have been advocating
> for bus priority lanes and park and ride systems for several years now
> and we are now finally  seeing the start of this with the Hills Rd bus
> priority system.
> These of course could become "notional tramlines" or "movement
> corridors" which could at a later stage  be converted to rail and the
> UDS is looking at this idea. However in terms of peak oil I don't
> believe the UDS goes far enough - it should include more specific
> strategic promotion of land use patterns that reduce transportation
> needs and promote use of public transport and walking/cycling. We should
> also be preserving farmland close to the city and encourage food
> production on this. This is not helped by the UDS allowing 60% green
> field development.

Thanks for your reply, Sally. It's particularly encouraging to hear your
views on preserving farmland as this is exactly the sort of enlightened
thinking we're going to need in the coming years. I personally would be
delighted to help in any process to formulate a Christchurch /
Canterbury response to Peak Oil. Also, as a member of Sustainable
Otautahi Christchurh (www.sustainablechristchurh.org.nz), the
preparedness of the city for Peak Oil is one of our major concerns and
we will be happy to help in any way we can.

The UDS was a well-meaning but fundamentally flawed attempt to manage
the assumed growth of the city based on simplistic assumptions about
continued levels of energy usage, population growth, resource
availability, etc. Inasmuch as the strategy is an evolving one, it would
still be the ideal vehicle for planning the future development of the
region, but it *must* challenge these fundamental assumptions about our
future, assumptions that are looking shakier day by day.

Cheers, Andrew.