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I'm not sure governments learn by seeing the mistakes of other governments. But consecutive New Zealand governments have made some big mistakes. Capitalist part

I'm not sure governments learn by seeing the mistakes of other governments. But consecutive New Zealand governments have made some big mistakes. Capitalist party sold the national rail to an Australian company because rail was inefficient and costing a ton. Privately run cut back staff significantly. A few years later the story was that that was failing privately run, so the socialist party bought it back at exhorbitant cost. Now current governmentis trying to sort out a massive budget blow-out to get "rail" ferries between North and South Islands working (roll-on roll-off). The private ferry (Bluebridge) is doing okay I think. I believe the lesson is that rail sucks here, economically speaking (whether privately run or publicly run). Unfortunately old voters love rail so the politicians pander to them.

tcmart14 2y ago
Dumb American, so I could be totally off base. But New Zealand appears small enough on the map that just doing a shit ton of barges along defined coastal water routes makes a lot more sense than trains. In the US trains could be efficient, but we are also like 2,500 miles coast to coast.
- o11c 2y ago
  The problem with water travel in New Zealand is that weather often closes ports. But it is true that NZ lacks the scale that many existing rail systems rely on, and also lacks high-speed roads (a good rule of thumb for driving anywhere in NZ is: look at how many miles it is on the map, calculate how fast you could go that far in America, then double the time).
- khuey 2y ago
  New Zealand doesn't have inland waterways the way the US does so barges don't seem sufficient. They did actually get a fancy self-propelled barge for use transporting minerals on the West Coast of the South Island last year and it got pushed aground by a storm in its first couple weeks of service. It's been sitting in port in Nelson ever since being refloated. https://maritime-executive.com/article/barge-to-innovate-new-zealand-coastal-shipping-grounds-in-storm https://maritime-executive.com/article/barge-to-innovate-new...
cycomanic 2y ago
The problem about New Zealand is that they hate investing in infrastructure and everyone loves the kiwi myth of the number 8 wire which means they just build provisional solution on top of provisional solution. The example of the ferries is a good one, the cost blow out was because they needed to build a new dock in Wellington. So instead of just living with the fact that yes building infrastructure as become expensive in a country which has seen a massive building boom (like many other places), the new Conservative government decides to cancel the ferry order without any alternative in place, and now the most important connection of the country is running on failing ferries which are more than 25 years old (there have been several incidents in the last couple of years where they were drifting powerless), and (especially considering the massive penalty for cancelling the contract) the new ferries will be just as expensive as the cancelled ones just being much smaller (the old contract was actually signed at quite advantageous economic times) and arriving much later. This is certainly not an example of rail not working. Trucks on the road are a massive disaster as well. Most roads are single lane, so it's not uncommon to be stuck behind trucks for long stretches, this is especially annoying considering that many roads are very windy and truck speed up when coming to passing lanes.

tcmart14 2y ago

Dumb American, so I could be totally off base. But New Zealand appears small enough on the map that just doing a shit ton of barges along defined coastal water routes makes a lot more sense than trains. In the US trains could be efficient, but we are also like 2,500 miles coast to coast.

o11c 2y ago
The problem with water travel in New Zealand is that weather often closes ports. But it is true that NZ lacks the scale that many existing rail systems rely on, and also lacks high-speed roads (a good rule of thumb for driving anywhere in NZ is: look at how many miles it is on the map, calculate how fast you could go that far in America, then double the time).
khuey 2y ago
New Zealand doesn't have inland waterways the way the US does so barges don't seem sufficient. They did actually get a fancy self-propelled barge for use transporting minerals on the West Coast of the South Island last year and it got pushed aground by a storm in its first couple weeks of service. It's been sitting in port in Nelson ever since being refloated. https://maritime-executive.com/article/barge-to-innovate-new-zealand-coastal-shipping-grounds-in-storm https://maritime-executive.com/article/barge-to-innovate-new...

cycomanic 2y ago

The problem about New Zealand is that they hate investing in infrastructure and everyone loves the kiwi myth of the number 8 wire which means they just build provisional solution on top of provisional solution. The example of the ferries is a good one, the cost blow out was because they needed to build a new dock in Wellington. So instead of just living with the fact that yes building infrastructure as become expensive in a country which has seen a massive building boom (like many other places), the new Conservative government decides to cancel the ferry order without any alternative in place, and now the most important connection of the country is running on failing ferries which are more than 25 years old (there have been several incidents in the last couple of years where they were drifting powerless), and (especially considering the massive penalty for cancelling the contract) the new ferries will be just as expensive as the cancelled ones just being much smaller (the old contract was actually signed at quite advantageous economic times) and arriving much later. This is certainly not an example of rail not working. Trucks on the road are a massive disaster as well. Most roads are single lane, so it's not uncommon to be stuck behind trucks for long stretches, this is especially annoying considering that many roads are very windy and truck speed up when coming to passing lanes.