As of last week, Simeon Brown is no longer the transport minister – he’s now the minister of health. Will his new portfolio lead him to consider evidence that New Zealand’s cycleways, initiated by former prime minister John Key, could save lives and billions in healthcare dollars? And will he regret that he slashed their funding? By Gill Higgins
Our cities’ bike networks are a work in progress. In Christchurch, the major routes are 65% complete, in the Capital, it’s 32% and in Auckland, just 22% of the network’s been finished. Yet, when he was transport minister, Simeon Brown slashed the funding for getting the job done. Now he’s health minister, he’ll be dealing with the consequences of making it more appealing to jump in the car rather than switch to a bike.
Half-baked bike networks can be problematic. There are just enough bike lanes to annoy drivers who feel that cycleways are always empty, and to frustrate any would-be cyclists who feel they can’t bike safely for their whole trip.
And now the foot’s well and truly off the accelerator. Last year’s Government Policy Statement on Transport allowed for $NZ465 million dollars to go towards commitments already made, but not for any new lanes to be added. Brown described the expenditure as “a huge amount of money”. But it’s a fraction of the $22 billion earmarked for roads. Also, it includes funding for the Te Ara Tupua sea wall between Petone and Wellington.
The Ministry of Transport’s former science advisor, Simon Kingham believes too much of the cycling budget is going towards the seawall which in his view isn’t a cycle project. “It’s actually a resilience project. It’s building up a sea wall to protect the road and the rail line from being flooded.”
It’s clear that the future of many planned cycleways is in the air. Some will go ahead, but they’re now reliant on council funding at a time when councils are having to tighten their belts. And with local elections this year, the issue of how to spend transport funds is likely to remain a hot potato for our main cities in the months to come. After all, who isn’t fed up with potholes? Who doesn’t want to be able to park right in front of every shop they visit? And who doesn’t hate a sea of traffic cones?
Longer cycleways, longer lives
But then again, who wouldn’t like to lower their risk of diabetes and cancer? A group called DAST (Doctors for Active, Safe Transport) say it would make a huge impact on public health if more people made short trips by bike instead of by car. It could save lives. It could save billions of dollars in healthcare. But that’s only possible if people feel safe when cycling. And that means a need for connected, extensive bike lanes and cycleways.
Dr David Tripp leads DAST. He has all the credentials. He used to be an economist for the Ministry of Health before deciding to train in medicine as an intensive care specialist. He knows all about statistics and costs and he’s on the frontline.
“I’m caring for all these people who are really sick. That’s my job. I love it, but it’s also heartbreaking, because it doesn’t need to be this way nearly so often. For example, if you’re a 50-year-old male who bikes regularly, you will have 45% less [risk of] cancer, 45% less [risk of] diabetes, 40% less [risk of] heart attacks”.
That’s a massive risk reduction and one we thought was worth passing on to Brown (who’s 33). He was still transport minister at the time. On a personal level, Brown decided cycling wasn’t for him. “Look I’m sure it would be better for me but ultimately at the same time I’ve got to get to places quickly and efficiently.”
I mentioned that other MPs incorporated cycling into their similarly busy lives. “Well good on them, I choose not to. I choose to drive a car and get where I need to go quickly because my time is important.”
He told us he goes to the gym. Any exercise is valuable. But if it’s easy to cycle to places like school and work, excercise can become a practical daily necessity as well as a healthy habit. Cycling can also save you money, with no need for gym membership and less need to fill your car with petrol for a commute.
The cost savings are a key factor in Mangere in South Auckland, where cycling’s being embraced more now that bike lanes have been built. Sokko Seeto from the cycling advocacy charity Time to Thrive says some in their community can’t afford a car, so the lanes provide a great alternative. And for Māori and Pasifika communities “the health aspect is absolutely amazing – diabetes, high cholesterol, a lot of this stuff, you know, plagues us”.
So Dr Tripp sees cycling as a really cost-effective way to bring down the country’s burden of disease. We have some of the highest rates of obesity and car dependency in the world. “And so, I feel like screaming at the system sometimes, you know, couldn’t we do this differently?”.
The issues of money and health come together when you consider the enormous financial cost to New Zealand of issues like cancer, diabetes and heart attacks.
David Tripp referred to a study from Otago University that showed billions of healthcare dollars could be saved if the New Zealand population switched short car trips to walking or cycling. Even if a portion of the population switched, the savings would still be significant. “I don’t think our transport planners, nor our health planners have got their heads around the very profound link between these two things.”
But it’s the kind of advice the recent scientific advisor to the Ministry of Transport could have provided when he was still in the role, before leaving in May last year. Kingham says that for most of the six years he was employed by the Ministry, he had meetings with the ministers every 4-6 weeks. These came to a stop when the current coalition government took power in November 2023. He says he was told the meetings were no longer part of the role, and that when it came to advice, “they didn’t listen at all”.
More specifically, he offered to advise on the draft Government Policy Statement on Transport, but in an email we’ve seen he was told “it’s being held very tight – specific team leads are being consulted as required for detailed input’. The Chief Scientific Advisor wasn’t among them.
We asked Simeon Brown why he didn’t listen to Kingham. “I’m not sure what particular advice he’s referring to,” he said.
The pollution factor
As well as reducing the burden of disease, cycling’s an effective way to reduce harmful emissions and cut pollution that causes respiratory disease. “I can’t believe they don’t know the evidence, which makes me think and conclude that, for whatever reason, they’re just ignoring it,” says Kingham.
So it’s ironic that the big push for cycleways in New Zealand came when National was previously in power. On a cloudy day in August in 2014, then Prime Minister John Key got on a bike and wobbled off for a photo shoot to mark the opening of the Grafton Gully cycleway. He announced $100 million in funding for urban bike routes, and another $333 million the following year.
And let’s not forget the funding of all the cycle trails up and down the country for the Nga Haerenga Great Rides network, built under the Key government for Kiwis and tourists to enjoy. In short, Key firmly believed cycle ways were the future. “I think they’re going to be hugely popular and really important for our cities.”
I reminded Brown of the former Prime Minister’s view, and that many international cities have policies focused on the reduction of car use.
Brown said New Zealand was different. “The reality is, if you look at the census data, despite the hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars spent on cycleways, we have not seen significant increases in the number of people using cycleways,” he says.
The census data is a snapshot of commuters on a single day. Looking at cycle counters paints a more positive picture. It shows millions travel by bike every month. The number of cyclists hit a high pre-Covid, then tailed off as we had to isolate, with a slow comeback as more people worked from home. But they’re on the rise again, with an increase of 15% in Auckland and 7% in Christchurch, when comparing the latest year’s data with the previous 12 months. Wellington is changing its method of measurement, but a comparison of cycling in February from 2023 to 2024 was 12.7%.
Brown did admit that “there are some really good examples where actually they are building dedicated cycleways where they aren’t taking away lanes of traffic, and you’re actually able to do this really well”.
Tripp welcomes the acknowledgement. He’d just like the funding to follow.
