Introduction
This is a joint submission by Greenpeace Aotearoa, Inc. and Generation Zero on the application by Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency and Transpower New Zealand Limited for Stage 1B1 of the Papakura to Drury South State Highway 1 Improvements under the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Act 2020.
Greenpeace is a global, independent campaigning organisation that acts to protect and conserve the environment and to promote peace. Greenpeace is one of the world‘s largest and oldest environmental organisations, operating for half a century, since 1971, and now works in more than 55 countries. The New Zealand branch of Greenpeace (Greenpeace Aotearoa) was founded in 1974 and has grown to represent 35,000 financial donors and many tens of thousands of supporters.
Generation Zero is a rangatahi-led climate justice organisation that mobilises New Zealanders to build people power to campaign for intergenerational climate justice.
Our collective vision is a world where people and nature are thriving – where our homes, schools, business and transport are powered by clean energy from the sun, wind and water; where our food is grown in ways that regenerate the land, store carbon in the soil, clean up rivers and bring back wildlife; where both the ocean and native forests are rebounding and teeming with life. Our vision is an Aotearoa where our children, grandchildren and generations to come can grow up safe from the threat of climate change and live in a fairer society that truly honours Te Tiriti O Waitangi.
We welcome the opportunity to submit on this application, given the impact the proposed project would have on the climate and biodiversity. Addressing the existential crisis of climate change has never been more urgent. Climate change is already taking lives and damaging health, homes, food security, culture and livelihoods. It is already accelerating the extinction of the wildlife and wild places with which we share this Earth. Poor and marginalised communities are already suffering the most, despite being the least responsible for causing this crisis. Government action, or inaction, over the next decade will determine the future for billions of people and the wildlife we share this planet with.
We do not support the application by Waka Kotahi to add a third lane in each direction on the Papakura – Drury section of SH1. While other aspects of the application are supported – specifically the improved walking/cycling infrastructure and facilitating passenger rail electrification – the substantive part of the project (increasing traffic lanes on SH1) is not supported. Increasing vehicle traffic lanes on SH1 will lead to an increase in greenhouse gas emissions and, through accelerating sprawl, a decrease in indigenous biodiversity and a degradation of some of New Zealand’s most important fertile soil. As a result, the project is inconsistent with both the intention of the Fast-Track Consenting Act and legal requirements under the Zero Carbon Act. Therefore, the EPA should reject this part of the application.
