Wayne Brown: This is the year Auckland takes back control

Sunday, 18 January 2026

Wayne Brown is Auckland mayor

OPINION: Make no mistake about it, this is a really big year for me as mayor of our only big city, for my council, for Aucklanders and for New Zealand as a whole.

Firstly, two of our nation’s most over-budget and over-time projects finally finish this year with the much awaited opening of the International Convention Centre and later this year City Rail Link (CRL). Lots of lessons on how not to do big projects here!

Then at long last council and myself as mayor get our hands on the much unloved Auckland Transport (AT). It will be converted into a focused public transport organisation doing the bits they weren’t too bad at - and all the rest that they are hopeless at coming back to council, which will become a road-controlling authority just like every other council.

This will be a big challenge but we are looking forward to having AT stop doing things the public dislike and refocus on solving actual problems and doing it better, cheaper and faster. This will take a real change in culture for those existing AT staff who we do accept into council and it won’t be all of them. It will also be bad news for the consultants who have lived off AT as we will immediately do things in a standard way rather than bespoke designs of every intersection, cycleway or bus stop.

As well as that, this year may well bring the first of the government’s City Deals into play. That’s provided we can agree on terms that set up our biggest council as a partner to work through issues like planning and transport - rather than just receiving unhelpful announcements like a rates cap, when we already have the lowest increases, and this year’s increase is to pay for the City Rail Link that the government and former councillors agreed to.

We need to get value out of CRL to justify its expense and that means maximising passenger numbers. That will be helped by more intensification along public transport routes rather than chopping up farmland just to keep land-bankers happy.

There are a host of things that council wants to make decisions about where Wellington thinks it knows better, and this year I will publish an updated manifesto of what we will do and what things are wanted from government. Mostly that’s less interference from what is a failing city where the seat of government sits.

The idea that council processes are holding up development is simply wrong. There are more than 9500 approved Resource Consents in Auckland that are not being actioned and that is because the economy is in trouble. Big developers like Ockham have 1700 units with full approvals including building consents that they are not moving on because of no buyers.

We want to plan our transport future based on logical plans to move goods and people around and through our city, not the need to meet foolish promises from political parties intent on being re-elected later this year in central government elections.

We need a say on secret decisions by NZTA about harbour crossings and proposed Roads of National Party Significance (RONS), and we need a say on the ludicrous cost of these proposals. One of my policies that was rewarded by my landslide victory for the mayoralty was to Stop Wasting Money and that applies to government just as much to council.

Council will also focus on how we can lift prosperity and there will be a focus on our Innovation & Technology Alliance and how to build more Rocketlabs and Halters, and a focus on extracting maximum benefit from the new flights from China to South America through Auckland, something that Tourism NZ thought wasn’t worth supporting.

To win the election later this year you need to win Auckland so political parties need to listen to what we want and I am driven by what is best for Aucklanders and New Zealand.

Good ideas from the accommodation industry for a bed night levy to fund big events here will not be allowed to wither simply because a minor party like ACT doesn’t like it.

So watch for a big year with pressure everywhere and sights set on a more powerful, prosperous Auckland city to emerge.

What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.