Posts by Gareth Ward
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I hate the place
Then I'm sure you'll understand when we suggest you aren't the sorta person we want to tell us how to sort out the place. Which we actually kinda like.
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I really don't get why most RWC games are to be shown on (at least) 4 different channels at the same time? Why exactly does TVNZ, MTS, TV3 and Sky all need to show the same thing?
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introducing competition for the only profitable part of the scheme is just creaming large amounts of public funds into private pockets while leaving taxpayers with most of the risk.
This this oh god this. And it's not just the most profitable parts, it's the most profitable people (i.e. leave ACC as a last resort provider - sweeeeeet, say the insurers, have all our costly bad risks)
The half-privatisation of ACC seems much worse to me than the full privatisation. And that's not a push for full privatisation btw =)
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Well yes , I suspect that Mainzeal and the Heavy Engineering Research Association now involved will have some say in the technical details to be released, and that before this goes anywhere near a "green light" it will be properly scoped.
I'm just very wary of "here we go again Auckland" - someone puts up an IDEA for something interesting and before it's even analysed we get "oh this won't work, no no can't do that". Hey if it all just doesn't work then so be it, but for ONCE can this city please give an idea a chance. Especially one that has enough backers to take it out of the "insane dreaming" basket and at least drop it in the "hey, maybe we could do that" one.
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And if we don't want to demolish the bridge - Highline anyone? ;)
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4) The world's best bridge builder says it is crap
Well the world's best bridge builder actually said "definitely build a new bridge but at first glance that initial concept doesn't seem to be the right one". So he's all for the project, but believes you need to get the functional design right.
Certainly agree that what we do with the traffic is the big thing - presumedly it would involve the Vic Park tunnel. If we could get it to dive under the city as soon as possible (presumedly not on Tank Farm but hopefully?) and into that setup then the effect isn't so massive. I await the technical design with interest. It does strike me that for the SAME budget as the full tunnel you could end up with something iconic on the water and fully acceptable on the city-side.
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Excellent - I've followed this for a while and whenever the harbour crossing has come up in discussion I've gleefully told people about demolitioning the existing bridge (now THERE'S your New Years Eve show) and selling St Marys' Bay.
A little disappointed in the "Kiwi designers can't do it" approach - I don't think it's our designers that are the issue, it's the commissions they get.Presuming Joshua's points around appropriate connection to Tank Farm and rail gradient can be sorted I will be majorly disappointed if this doesn't get the go ahead. Feels like a bit of a defining thing for Auckland for me even - do we do the old-thinking, no-design approach or try something a bit smarter and interesting? If you're listening Mr Key - this might actually be the sort of thing that "keeps our loved ones here", not a 30% tax rate...
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Wouldn't most people who think HD is vital for watching sport be SKY subscribers anyway?
I certainly would like to see it in HD and am not a Sky Sports subscriber.
But again, this is presumedly part of the IRB's decision making process. -
I'd much rather the government didn't give anyone money for one-off populist events to appear on TV.
Oh for sure. I just mean that each channel should have approached it's "shareholder" for funding as per normal arrangements. In an ideal world, a coordinated Government investment process would have seen those jointly assessed but so long as they each made whatever hurdles, then the politico's should have left the tender process up to the IRB.
There is a bit of a feeling that there's a "double-up" on spending - but they only payout for the successful bid.
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This is what should have happened in the first place.
I can't help but feel what should have happened in the first place was the Government saying "we'll give $5m to whichever of you win, but you're operationally independent TV companies making a tender to the IRB so it's not a political decision"
It just feels like they're trying to have their "corporatised, arms-length SOE" model-cake and eat it too.