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22. 10. 97
CENTRAL CITY COMMITTEE
14 OCTOBER 1997
A special meeting of the Central City
Committee
was held on Tuesday 14 October 1997 at 4.00 pm
| PRESENT: | Councillor Margaret Murray (Chairman), The Mayor, Councillors Graham Berry, Anna Crighton, Newton Dodge, Morgan Fahey, Alister James and Charles Manning. |
| IN ATTENDANCE: | Councillor David Close. |
| APOLOGIES: | An apology for absence was received and accepted from Councillor Barbara Stewart. |
| Councillor Alister James arrived at 4.12 pm and was present for all clauses. | |
| The Mayor arrived at 4.15 pm and was present for all clauses. | |
| Councillor Morgan Fahey left the meeting at 5.05 pm and was not present for clause 2. |
The Committee reports that:
PART A - MATTERS REQUIRING A COUNCIL DECISION
1. CENTRAL CITY ELECTRIC SHUTTLE BUS RR 6353
| Officer responsible | Author |
| City Streets, and Environmental Policy and Planning Managers | Stuart Woods and Chris Kerr |
| Corporate Plan Output: Policy Advice - Transportation | |
The purpose of this report is to present the work and investigations of the Sub-Committee investigating the central city shuttle bus proposal. The Sub-committee met on two occasions to discuss the proposal; on 10 September with representatives from a bus manufacturer, an electric battery motor systems company and the CRC; and on 25 September with representatives of CTL.
OBJECTIVES
For purposes of clarifying the reasons for undertaking this investigation, the objectives of the proposal are given here. The objectives for the central city electric battery shuttle proposal fall into three main categories.
(a) Central City Viability
The objectives are to:
- further improve and add to the central city image.
- provide another perspective for people to enjoy the central city.
- better integrate and improve access to and links between dispersed commercial, retail, professional, civic, entertainment and cultural activities of the central city, especially for the elderly, mothers with children, and the disabled.
- encourage people to move easily around the central city by providing a highly visible and easily understood public transport service.
- provide a simple, friendly service to enable tourists to travel around the central city, as the central city locations that tourists wish to visit are often separated by some distance.
- make parking a vehicle easier by increasing the parking catchment for many central city attractions and businesses. People could park further from their destination and catch the shuttle.
The Communications and Promotions Unit Manager has previously stated that the shuttle will not improve the marketing success of the central city itself.
(b) Environmental Enhancement
The objectives are to:
- provide a flagship project demonstrating an efficient transport alternative to the modern motor car; and promoting conservation of energy resources.
- clearly demonstrate the City's commitment to the use and development of clean green environmentally friendly transport systems, making it a national leader in the field.
- reduce reliance on and use of the private car for central city movement, thus reducing traffic congestion and pollution (noise and air) within the central city.
(c) Promotion Of Public Passenger Transport
The objectives are to:
- improve the image of public passenger transport by using new, modern looking, user friendly vehicles.
- improve usage of public passenger transport city-wide by providing a high quality, fast, cheap service.
- transport commuters between public transport terminals and city car parks, and their work places.
LETTERS OF SUPPORT
Attached are letters of support from the Casino and from the Inner City Promotion Team (confirming its previous support for the proposal). Several other central businesses have verbally expressed support and interest in the proposal.
OPERATING PARTNERSHIP
A significant outcome of the Sub-committee investigation was the concept of entering into a three way partnership between the Council, an operator and a vehicle supplier. This was seen as an appropriate course to pursue as opposed to the normal competitive tendering process, given the experimental nature of the service, the new technology involved and the variety of objectives including several non-commercial ones. Such a collaborative approach is seen as a means of bringing together the various parties interested in the proposal in the most co-operative environment and allowing a sharing of risk, pooling of knowledge and the maximising of the chances of a successful venture and service provision.
Given the unusual nature of legislation surrounding the operation of a proposal such as the above partnership, a legal opinion was sought from the Office Solicitor. (Note: the Office Solicitor has advised that the Council should call for proposals from other parties also).
NEW VEHICLE
In the previous report to this committee in August, issues of the vehicles reliability in service were raised. Information being reviewed at that time showed that some vehicles were up to six times less reliable than equivalent diesel powered vehicles. Further investigations have concluded that the main problems being reported from overseas experience have been addressed and the vehicles available for this proposal should now be as reliable as other vehicles in the public transport fleet.
At the August committee meeting there was discussion regarding the use of a hybrid (electric battery/diesel) vehicle rather than a purely electric battery powered bus. Whilst these vehicles have a diesel motor on board, it is a small motor running at its most efficient settings and built to Euro 2 specifications (a very strict set of guidelines relating to emissions, which are unable to be tested in the Southern Hemisphere presently due to a lack of sufficiently sensitive and appropriate equipment). The bus has been designed so that the diesel motor can easily be removed and the vehicle converted to solely electric battery powered. The hybrid can operate for some time without the diesel motor running, as the diesel motor only provides a recharging function when the batteries are being drawn down. Work on this type of bus is well advanced and trial vehicles are already being tested. It is now recommended that this type of vehicle is employed, at least initially, for this proposal with a view to ultimately moving to solely electric battery power at an appropriate point.
Discussions with the Council's Energy Manager have indicated that the use of electric battery vehicles is an environmental issue rather than a matter of energy efficiency. Electric vehicles, in fact, require more primary energy to be generated and more fossil fuel to be burnt nationwide. However, an opportunity exists to take advantage of a cheaper night rate electricity that would be used for charging the vehicle batteries. For a solely electric vehicle, energy cost savings of around 5 cents per km can be made in comparison with diesel fuel; for a hybrid vehicle the savings will be smaller. If such energy cost savings are made available to the Council, then consideration can be given for a subsidy to the project from the Council's energy efficiency projects budget.
The relative volumes of exhaust emissions from the hybrid vehicle compared to a standard diesel vehicle are under investigation. Needless to say, the emissions of a smaller diesel motor running at optimum steady state conditions will produce less emissions than the larger diesel motors used to
power a bus in general running conditions (a variety of acceleration, deceleration, steady running and idling).
Reports on the comparative running costs between diesel and battery powered buses have been prepared by Designline (produced in associated with the electric battery motor systems company), and Booz-Allen and Hamilton, an international transportation consultancy. A summary of the reports will be presented at the Committee meeting.
CONCLUSION
The work of the Sub-Committee has clarified some of the key issues relating to this project and it is now appropriate for this Committee to signal its support, or otherwise, for the project to proceed. The Council, in adopting its 1997 Annual Plan, has committed itself to six months expenditure on this project.
The recent three way partnership discussions have indicated that it is realistic to successfully undertake this project within the adopted Annual Plan budget figure.
The project would be undertaken using initially a `hybrid' electric battery/diesel bus, the manufacturer believes that it is possible for this project to successfully operate using an electric only bus. This opportunity would be evaluated once the project is operating.
The project meets a number of important objectives and has the potential to result in the wider use of electric buses in Christchurch in the relatively short term. That would bring many benefits not the least of which is the reduction of vehicle generated (air and noise) pollution and an improved public perception of Public Passenger Transport.
| Recommendation: |
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PART C - REPORT ON DELEGATED DECISIONS TAKEN BY THE COMMITTEE
2. CAPITAL SMOOTHING PROJECT RR 6355
Central City Projects included in the Five Year Programme from year 2 to year 5 were scheduled.
Colombo Street (Armagh to Gloucester) was identified as the top priority for the 1998/99 year.
However it was noted that the major project in the Central City is the proposed Car park with the Art Gallery.
The Car park is currently scheduled to commence in the 1999/00 year with the art gallery commencing in the 2000/01 year.
The Committee was of the view that both projects would proceed concurrently and resolved to recommend to the Strategy and Reserves Committee that the car park provision of $6.5m be moved back one year from 1999/00 to 2000/01.
The meeting concluded at 5.50 pm.
CONSIDERED THIS 22ND DAY OF OCTOBER 1997
MAYOR