Choke point

This is the Waterview link at the moment. The houses on the left (Blockhouse Bay Rd) are in the Mt Albert electorate and will be bulldozed under the current scheme for a part of the surface motorway between the two tunnels.
The new stretch opened at the weekend feels like it takes 10 minutes off the journey according to people who have traveled it. But the down side is the added congestion through the west to meet the advancing head of the South-Western SH20 motorway from New Lynn and beyond. And we will probably see traffic getting off at PtChev/Waterview interchange on the NW and going down the straights, to Blockhouse Bay Rd (intersection in image at top) and down New North to get to Richardson Rd and the start of the motorway. And in the other direction. These roads are busy enough now between the rush hours. And the intersection at New North and Blockhouse Bay Rds is at capacity already. It can only get worse.

The rat-runners will find ways through the maze of local streets to get between the two motorways. Until the SH16-20 link - in whatever form it takes - is complete the traffic situation through the 'burbs in the middle will become ever more intolerable.

I live along one section of Great North Rd before Waterview that is officially zoned as a no-parking "Clearway" in the rush hours; but no-one parks there at any time because if they did it would become a single lane in that direction and there would be queues back across the Whau and back into New Lynn into the afternoon, and on the other side queues back down the Waterview straights until about 7pm. It is through the understanding of the local residents that this does not occur. It is their good will only preventing a choke.

The Clearway fiction is delusional traffic planning - the road needs to be four lanes the whole way, with bus stop bays, but that would admit the chronic situation. So everyone who makes decisions pretends the endless stream of traffic - including heavy vehicles does not exist. It is these local elements that will need remedying in advance of any link that may otherwise exacerbate the problem.

No-one wants their community to be sacrificed.

Meanwhile the NZ Herald seems to have come around to my way of thinking on where the thing should be heading. However some form of Waterview/Pt Chev interchange link to the tunnel should be made to get the inevitable traffic off the local streets.