Public transport is for other people [updated]

They want you to spend $3 billion adding a tunnel to their system (above), but they won’t use the system themselves.

Staff at the agency that runs and promotes public transport in Auckland, complete with ads on the back of buses crowing how much faster buses are than cars, are refusing to use public transport themselves between their office right beside the downtown Britomart rail and bus terminal and their office right beside the Henderson rail and bus terminal.

They’re refusing to use public transport because, they say, public transport is too slow. About which, of course, they’re right.

So instead, their bosses are having you pay $122,000 over six months for a private “shuttle.”

Same story for staff at Auckland Council, for whom their public-transport-promoting overlords have provided a shuttle between their central and Takapuna offices.

It adds lustre to the famous survey in which ninety-five percent of folk surveyed thought other people should use public transport.

Story with audio here.

UPDATE: Public Transport Blog comments.