Small Towns or Auckland's Problems

[murray-spi-investments]

Your friendly local council will ping you well over $10,000 for your reserve contribution if you are in auckland. They are happy to be as greedy as they can be - the power of a monopoly.

While on the topic of the relative worth of local councils. When I added my Auckland city rates bill , the ARC rates bill and the water bill together I am now paying over $3000 per year in rates on my own home. As these until a few years ago were all on the same bill (which I think was just under $2000 five years ago). I am really concerned if Johnny Banks
,the Auckland major, gets approval for his $3,000,000,000 motorway. No one in Auckland could afford to live here, which would of course diminish the traffic congestion somewhat.

[muppet]

Hi Murray

It's about time big business realised that in this day of fast technology that it would be cheaper to run their businesses from the provinces instead of persevering with the hassles of being based in Auckland.

I am sure that if one or two big businesses relocated to a town like, ummmmm, say Tokoroa they would find that what takes their workers five days to do in Auckland could be done in two.

One saving for a starter would be in the less time it takes their workers to get to work.

But then big businesses don't like being proved wrong.

Regards

[janesco]

Hi Muppet

I haven't quite figured it out yet. Which is it?

You either are the Mayor of Tokoroa or you own Tokoroa.

Maybe you are the President of the local business organisation.

Whatever is I have to agree with you except you picked the wrong town. It should be Wanganui

Allan S

[muppet]

Hi Alan

No mate. I live too far away from Tokoroa to be mayor.
Some investors both on and off shore own anything up to 10 IPs in Tokoroa. I have one which I intend to move into when I retire. Then I can become a bird spotter.

It could be any medium to larger town eg Whanaganui or is it Wanganui, Rotorua, Tokoroa, Palmerston North etc. I feel New Plymouth is too far from Auckland. Similarly Napier and Gisborne.

But I feel Hamilton is maybe the city which will make the greatest growth over the next few years.

Hey what about Huntly now that a $500m power station is to be built. Also $15m is being spent on upgrading the Tainui Bridge across the Waikato River for it to be able to take the anticipated heavy loads.
Those who bought there should show a lot of CG now.

Ngaruawahia house prices have also shown huge CG. Those who bought through ESC should be very happy.

Regards

[graemeh]

One saving for a starter would be in the less time it takes their workers to get to work.

So where do you get these workers from if you are the only business of your type in town?

That's the advantage of the big city, there is a larger employee pool.

[RentMaster]

Hey what about Huntly now that a $500m power station is to be built. Also $15m is being spent on upgrading the Tainui Bridge across the Waikato River for it to be able to take the anticipated heavy loads.
Those who bought there should show a lot of CG now.

There are plans to extend the Auckland motorway right down to Hamilton. The plans I saw is bad news for Huntly, because the new road is going to bypass Huntly by about 5km. It is going to become another Pokeno.

Is good news or Hamilton though.

[muppet]

Hi Guys

Have set up a new thread and relocated the above postings because they had nothing to do with Ali's subdivision problem.

Regards

[muppet]

Hi Guys

More on Huntly:
1. Solid Energy is hoping to lift annual production from 1.5M tonnes of coal to 5m tonnes within 5 years.

2. Unemployment numbers in Huntly have come down from 681 in 2002 to 328 at present.

3. 278 homes were bought in the year to June compared with 137 in 2003 and 107 in 2002.
So someone knows something or is it just the cheap housing in small towns offering +cashflow attracting investors.

Also when the new motorway goes through in whenever, then Huntly will become the halfway point between Auckland and Hamilton and people will want the quiet lifestyle to soak up in the evenings and weekends after being through the turmoil of working in Auckland during the day.

Regards

[CJ]

Why focus on Huntly which is just a big hole (full of Coal).

Why not whangarei which has closer access to nice beaches and the sunny north. We are just a toll road away from a quick drive up there. There are beach subdivisions close to town taht would service the rich and the house prices for the rest of the town aren't that bad to service the workers.

[donna]

It's all not going to happen - just like every other country - a big city is a must and businesses generally want to be where the action is - and that's not in a place like Tokoroa (haha) - geez does Tokoroa have a decent cafe?

I don't mean to pick on Tokoroa - I'm not anti Tokoroa at all...(don't own property there however). NZ needs Auckland - just not John Banks....and don't send him to Wellington, actually he'd be fried here given his obnoxious comments about the capital.

My few cents worth - thanks

Cheers,

Donna

[Gatekeeper]

How about this angle - I caught this on scoop.

Government about to make a monumental mistake
Friday, 13 August 2004, 3:34 pm
Press Release: Powerless New Zealand

PowerLess New Zealand

PowerLess NZ is a growing group of scientists, energy analysts and concerned citizens whose principle objectives are to alert both Government and the general public to New Zealand’s looming energy crisis. Our aim is to support development of renewable energy resources at both a private and public level, as well as encourage a firm move away from dependence upon fossil fuels.

13 August 2004, Wellington

Government about to make a monumental mistake.

“Truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion” Francis Bacon.

It is clear that policy makers, Government bigwigs, ostentatious self-promoting Mayors and general associated ignorami are about to make an error of monumental proportions. The mistake involves the gross misappropriation of public funds to build roading systems in Auckland and throughout NZ that in all likelihood will be empty of drivers early next decade. Powerless NZ urge all New Zealanders to hold these people to account as they blindly stumble into this mistake.

The paradigm of the internal combustion engine literally driving suburban life as well as our economy is about to come crashing down around us. Global production of oil is simply unable to meet growing demand. The warning signs ought to be clearly evident to all by now however we outline them again in case they were missed:

Oil prices have increased by about 40% this year. OPEC, traditionally the swing producer, able to make up for shortfalls in supply, this week have admitted to only having 600,000 barrels of oil spare capacity, this represents 0.73% of the daily global demand. OPECs President last week claimed “we have no more capacity”, the following day he withdrew the statement (interesting to say the least). The world consumes about 82.7 million barrels of oil per day. Yukos provided just over 1% of the daily global supply. China’s demand in oil is growing at about 20% per annum, with no sign of slowing up in the near future. Demand for oil by 2007 is expected to be around 90 million barrels per day. Global production peak within the next year or two is expected to be about 85 million barrels per day, once the world is producing at the peak there simply will be no ability to produce more.

By the end of this decade there will be a physical shortage of available oil caused by the peak production event. The world will be demanding more than the available supply. No markets, no technology will provide the shortfall. Any decrease in the price will simply increase the demand thus exacerbating the problem.

What is New Zealand’s Government doing about this impending crisis? Spending billions on roads of course.

Without conducting appropriate risk analyses taking into consideration the predicted production peak this Government and its petrol-headed buddy John Banks are guilty of serious misappropriation of public funds. We urge all New Zealanders to hold these people to account immediately – preferably before they make the mistake.

At the very least all ministers (including the Prime Minister) should be happy to stand up in public and say “we have considered the global peak oil production issue and are continuing with our multibillion dollar roading construction plans regardless”.

This large-scale gross wastage of public money will be felt seriously as global production of oil falls below demand causing record elasticity in oil prices and the world is subsequently plunged into recession. The public will come to the realisation later this decade that this money could have been better spent.

An immediate reconsideration of how this money is to be spent giving consideration to the global peak oil issue should commence right now.

Powerless NZ August 2004.

ENDS

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/PO0408/S00137.htm

[Gerrard]

So the lack of oil is going to leave our roads empty? I think not. There are alternatives already on the road, and they are only going to become more affordable as oil increases in price.

Even if the price of petrol doubles over the next few years there will be little change in driving behaviour. Especially in Auckland where there isn't the public transport system or even the density of living to make one effective!

Nice idea tho. Fewer cars on the road would make cycling to work much more plesant.

Gerrard

[donna]

So maybe all those inner city apartments - may infact be a good investment?

Donna

[Gatekeeper]

Maybe Donna
Small space, low energy use. Maybe the investment of the future.
But I'd wait for them to go down a fair bit yet

[Stevo]

oil decline and the property crash

I think Gatekeeper might be onto something.
I discovered this on the net today

http://www.lefthook.org/Reviews/Wheeler083004.html

It's about "peak oil" apparently the world is about to hit global peak oil, which means after that oil production goes into decline, harder to get out, more expensive etc, but the big issue is that supply won't be able to meet demand.

The web is full of this stuff... just search google for "Peak Oil" or check out these links

http://www.peakoil.net/

or

http://www.oilcrash.com

we are in for a rude awakening people...

if you want to minimise your risk I urge you to check this out.

By the way, that group PowerLess NZ, they've published a lot more stuff, internationally too.

This on an energy web site...

NZ Relies on flawed global oil production data

http://www.energybulletin.net/1799.html

apparently they are scientists...

stevo.