City Rail Link boss concedes communication with struggling Albert St businesses 'probably' not good enough

Thursday, 6 June 2019

Auckland's City Rail Link could cost a lot more than the original estimate of $3.4 billion.

City Rail Link's chief executive has admitted the company's communication of construction deadlines with struggling Albert St businesses may not be up to scratch.

Dr Sean Sweeney on Thursday fronted a heated meeting at central Auckland's Shakespeare Hotel, which has become a gathering place for a cluster of disgruntled Albert St retailers.

The business owners are demanding compensation for losses caused by lengthy rail passage works near their businesses.

City Rail Link chief executive Sean Sweeney, right, says CRLL 'probably haven't' communicated deadlines for the Albert St works clearly.

But Sweeney says compensation is out of the question from City Rail Link Limited's (CRLL) perspective, adding businesses need to approach the Government or Auckland Council for financial relief.

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However, he has conceded CRLL 'probably haven't' communicated deadlines for the Albert St works clearly enough.

Rakuten Japanese Cuisine owner Kingna Yu has seen her business struggle alongside ongoing CRL works on Albert St.

'One thing that's happened is we've taken on a whole lot of extra work here to improve the quality of the streetscape – that's outside the original scope of the CRL,' Sweeney told reporters after the meeting.

'We could've just done our work and walked away and we would've been done by the end of this year, but then another crew would've come in a couple of weeks later.

Albert Street's Shakespeare Hotel has become a meeting place for disgruntled CRL neighbours. Owner Sunny Kaushal has seen his earnings plummet.

'That's why the job is going on a lot longer.'

Earlier this year, Sweeney told Stuff the Albert St works were 'some months behind schedule'.

On Thursday, he said CRLL was continually looking at ways to make construction less disruptive.

'We are going to come back [to the businesses] with some work we've done around that,' he said.

'We were here to listen – because I don't think they felt they had been listened to – to hear what they had to say and, within the realms of what we could do, come back to them with some thoughts.

'We're going to have a discussion about how can we make things go faster [and] be less disruptive.'

Sweeney described Thursday afternoon's meeting as 'difficult'.

'There's a lot of people under a lot of stress and we understand that,' he said.

'It was never going to be an easy meeting for anyone in it – we couldn't give them what [compensation] they wanted.

'That's not our remit to do that.'

Auckland Central MP Nikki Kaye said she would be fighting to 'try and get a shift' when it came to compensation.

'CRLL made it very clear that the only people that could change that are the mayor and the Minister of Transport,' she said.

'This is an extraordinary situation where you've got residents and businesses who have long-term disruption over multiple years.'

Kaye, along with Heart of the City, would write to CRLL seeking commitments about the stages of works.

The National MP said business owners felt they had been 'trodden all over'.

'This issue of the level of bad treatment, the lack of communication … is real, it's palpable, you could feel it in the room,' Kaye said.

'I've said to CRLL I think that they should consider an apology. We got a little bit of that today, but I think that is also important for the businesses.'

Sweeney told Stuff said CRLL would work to 'minimise the disruption, to minimise the timeline, to communicate better'.

'And to do a whole range of things around how the construction interacts and impacts with the retailers.'