Looks like rail enabled ferries may be back

Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, March 1st, 2025 - 36 comments
Categories: Christopher Luxon, infrastructure, national, nicola willis, nz first, same old national, winston peters - Tags:

You have to hand it to Winston and New Zealand First. On the issue of rail enabled ferries they have performed outstanding work.

That good that what looked like a foregone conclusion, the dismantling of the Cook Strait Rail Link, may not happen after all.

From Corin Dann at Radio New Zealand:

The giant Korean ship builder Hyundai could be back in the running to build two new Cook Strait ferries, following a meeting between the company and Rail Minister Winston Peters in Seoul on Friday.

The government last year cancelled an order with Hyundai to build two mega ferries, citing a $3 billion cost blowout associated with the ferries and the required port upgrades.

Peters as new Rail Minister has since embarked on a world-wide tender to find by the end of March a builder for two cheaper and smaller rail-enabled ferries, and have them running by 2029.

He said Hyundai was open to considering bidding to build the new smaller ferries and had indicated it could meet the size specifications involved in that.

“I’ve got a serious contender back in the ring of potential contenders for the tender for two replacement ferries for the Cook Strait.”

“We’re positive that this is a great start to either this or other companies getting in to the tender process and being able to make a decision by the end of March. Yes I am very confident,” Peters said.

If he pulls this off he will achieve three significant goals. He will look to a large part of the country as someone prepared to work in the national interest. He will make Christopher Luxon’s talk about rail capable ferries look really weak. And he will severely dent Nicola Willis’s already tattered reputation. He will have in part fixed up what her anti rail impulse has cost the country although I am sure there will still be a cost.

And with H2 among the negotiating parties I have a sense that Winston is serious and may achieve something. All strength to him.

Which raises the issue of how does Labour deal with NZ First. At times in the past they have proved to be a capable and competent coalition partner. And Winston’s grasp of foreign affairs is damned good.

But then we get Mangonui Shane talking about “Climate munchkins” and “climate change wacky policies” to spark up support from climate change deniers.

And the question has to be, how can you deal with a party with people like Shane and Casey Costello in it.

In the meantime however all I can say is go well Winston. On this issue progressives and workers are cheering you on.

36 comments on “Looks like rail enabled ferries may be back ”

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  1. Tiger Mountain 1
    1 March 2025 at 1:55 pm

    Winston will for ever be an unrecalcitrant tory, migrant basher, Talleys supporter, “handbrake” on Jacinda Ardern’s first Govt. etc. but…if he does something useful now and then, fair enough. The Provincial Growth Fund did some good work in the regions, that in a non neo liberal state would have just been part of normal infrastructure maintenance, not special pleading, but many small communities appreciated it.

    Natzos are going to eat humble pie on Cook Strait ferries or risk very soon, the two main islands being without regular, reliable, maritime and rail links–or more likely in Baldrick’s mind risk a snap election.

    • alwyn 1.1
      1 March 2025 at 3:06 pm

      Why should National have to "eat humble pie"?

      As I remember it they cancelled the ferries because they were to big and would need a massive expenditure to build new terminal facilities.

      I don't remember them saying that they wouldn't allow rail enabled ferries.

      I personally think that rail enabled ships is unnecessary but that is my opinion and not, as far as I remember, the Governments view. I may be wrong of course.

      • KJT 1.1.1
        1 March 2025 at 3:54 pm

        Why should National have to "eat humble pie"?

        Because they fucked up.

        • Bearded Git 1.1.1.1
          1 March 2025 at 10:40 pm

          True KJT. We will end up with two smaller ferries costing the same as two larger ferries.

          Which makes me think, surely we need three new ferries to run sufficient capacity on this route?

          And even new ferries need maintenance and will have breakdowns and have accidents occasionally?

          • JonnyE 1.1.1.1.1
            2 March 2025 at 6:55 am

            Plus lose the weather days the bigger ferries can handle.

          • alwyn 1.1.1.1.2
            2 March 2025 at 11:58 am

            What were you going to do with two larger ferries that had no port facilities they could use? The problem was that you would have had a couple of larger ferries and a bill of at least $3 billion to build the new terminals at Wellington and Picton.

            • KJT 1.1.1.1.2.1
              2 March 2025 at 6:04 pm

              Now. We are going to have smaller ferries, for a greater cost. AND, a bill of over three billion for infrastructure.

              National will just spread it out and fudge who is paying it. But I guarantee it will end up much more than three billion. Even if you keep the total costs to the economy out of it.

              Meanwhile National intend to go ahead with roading infrastructure projects with negative real ROI'S.

      • joe 1.1.3
        2 March 2025 at 9:57 am

        Rail enabled not necessary?
        Wow.
        Sorry, but that is like living under a rock.
        It is essential to enable a free uninterrupted flow between the islands.

        • alwyn 1.1.3.1
          2 March 2025 at 12:42 pm

          Why are they so necessary? After all the ferry Aratere ran aground in June last year and was out of service for about six weeks. Did anyone really notice or care?

          Well it is the only rail enabled ferry. None of the other four ferries carry rail wagons. Were there any problems because we didn't shift rail wagons across the strait during that unplanned outage?

          • Tane 1.1.3.1.1
            3 March 2025 at 1:00 pm

            Yeah I can confirm it has implications for port operations and turnaround times. With more moving parts it adds more expense and time which has knock on effects for fuel consumption. This is potentially something that could be streamlined but the extra costs over 30 years could be far greater than spending now. Also there is now the issue of a drop in capacity and having to give your competitors more market share when they need to pay these new ferries off. The issue of size for the sounds has been well covered and the slightly smaller new option will still need to meet the same criteria.

      • Jennie 1.1.4
        2 March 2025 at 10:29 am

        Oh my lordy lady, you are so WRONG!

        Ww so need rail capable ferries which would be a great help getting goods across the strait, & also to get rail up & running for goods which wud also take huge trucks off our roads..

        Plus the shitty natz so need to eat humble pie because of the total f/up made out of spite by nillis willis the rotten to the core cretin!!!

        • alwyn 1.1.4.1
          2 March 2025 at 12:50 pm

          Apparently only five percent of all rail traffic crosses Cook Strait. Of that five percent a significant portion will be unloaded from rail wagons, transported across and then reloaded onto the rail. I can't find the exact amount.

          It really isn't going to get many road vehicles scrapped though is it?

          Do you really want rail-enabled ships just because the National Party MPs may not? That seems to be the only justification for your last sentence.

          • Incognito 1.1.4.1.1
            2 March 2025 at 1:06 pm

            Apparently only five percent of all rail traffic crosses Cook Strait. Of that five percent a significant portion will be unloaded from rail wagons, transported across and then reloaded onto the rail. I can’t find the exact amount.

            Apparently, you couldn’t find anything to support your reckons, but ‘only five percent’ is clearly sufficiently low enough to support your narrative that seems to be misleading.

            About 5 percent of total freight moved by rail (tonnes) is inter-island freight. This proportion increases to 20 percent if measured using freight tonne kms reflecting the long-distance nature of inter-island rail freight (eg, Auckland-Christchurch).

            https://www.treasury.govt.nz/sites/default/files/2024-05/project-irex-t2023-1425.pdf

            • alwyn 1.1.4.1.1.1
              2 March 2025 at 1:16 pm

              You still only have to put it on the ship and take it off once regardless of how far it has travelled to get there or how far it will travel after it gets off the ship.

              I can't see that it will encourage people to do long distances on the road rather than load and unload the rail wagons at the ports on each side of the strait. It just makes the cost on unloading and loading the ship a smaller component of the total freight bill.

              • Incognito …
                2 March 2025 at 3:24 pm

                sigh

                You didn’t read the link, did you?

                KiwiRail has indicated that 4 percent of rail freight (by volume) across Cook Strait is on specialised rail wagons and in its view without a rail-enabled connection, it is highly likely that this volume would revert back to road. It is unclear how the 4 percent estimate has been derived. Given the relatively small proportion of the inter-island movements, the impact of the potential loss of rail specific freight on overall mode shift is likely to be small.

                Apparently, this the exact amount you couldn’t find and fits right into your narrative.

                Frankly, I don’t want to take you by the hand and lead you through the internet to show you something to make you change your mind.

                Let’s see if that rings a bell.

                • alwyn …
                  2 March 2025 at 3:58 pm

                  That link suggests that 4% of the freight carried by rail and across Cook Strait cannot be unloaded and put onto the ferry. It implies that 96% could be unloaded and carried on a non-rail enabled ship. I wanted to know how much was in fact unloaded, by choice, and how much could be unloaded from rail wagons but for some reason never was.

                  That would include the 4% your link identifies but could be more. It was that possibly higher number I was looking for.

                  If all of it is in fact unloaded and then put on the ships without the wagons, or would happily have the unloading done, it would seem that only 4% of 5%, or 0.2% of New Zealand rail freight needs a rail enabled ferry. In that case I would say we certainly don't need to spend the money to have them at all.

      • Ben 1.1.5
        2 March 2025 at 11:53 am

        Clearly you have no understanding of what you're talking about. Yes the ferries were supposedly canceled because of cost blowouts in shoreside infrastructure, but that had little if anything to do with the size of the ferries. No matter what size the new ferries are they are still going to have to spend hundreds of millions on new terminals as the old ones are not fit for purpose and in some cases have already been partly condemned. Not to mention that what we have is 60 plus years old and is too smal even for the existing sized ships which at times have to sit alongside with thrusters running just to stay on the berth.

        What research did national do before canceling everything, did they look at the state things were in did they consider whether there could be savings on the new terminals? Did they consider that the ferries which had been ordered were a steal of a deal, and anything they order now are likely to be over twice the price.

        No they did nothing it was a knee jerk reaction by national because they were rail enabled and ordered under the previous labour government. They said right from the start that rail enabled was not necessary and was not going to be a requirement for their solution.

        • alwyn 1.1.5.1
          2 March 2025 at 1:07 pm

          Do you buy things just because they appear to be cheap, even if you don't need them?

          There was quite a good article in the Herald last year on the topic of the ferries.

          https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/what-does-rail-enabled-cook-strait-ferries-mean-and-can-kiwirail-survive-without-them/4NPYW63IH5EQDHWAR733774VZY/

          The Chairman of CentrePort, who I will assume was well briefed, points out that Rail-enabled operation is more complicate than RoPax. He said

          “To berth a rail ship, the landside linkspan needs to be joined to the back of the ship.

          “The reason it has to be pinned to the ship is because you’ve got about 25 mils of tolerance to get a wagon from the linkspan onto the ship.”

          The Aratere was attached to the linkspan at the time of the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake and it snapped off due to the movement, Johnstone said.

          “It’s not like a RoPax ferry where you simply put a ramp down and a vehicle drives across from the land onto the ramp and any movement with the wind or the tide is soaked up with the movement of the ramp.

          “It’s much more complex and as a consequence of that, there is additional expense and there’s additional risk around resilience.”

          In the same article the Ministry of Transport say

          "Only about 5% of total freight moved by rail crosses Cook Strait, they said.

          “Almost all rail freight can still be carried across Cook Straight through road bridging (which is invisible to KiwiRail customers, and who are likely to be indifferent about how their goods are moved onto the ferry).”

          On quicker turnaround times, officials said an independent assessment concluded there would only be “marginal advantages” with rail-enabled ferries, although operating costs would be higher."

          During Parliamentary hearings the Rail executives were asked if the could operate with only rail compatible ferries. They answered Yes

          "During a select committee appearance, KiwiRail bosses were asked directly whether they could cope with rail-compatible ships rather than rail-enabled ones.

          The answer was: “Yes.”

          I think that the need for rail enabled ferries has been greatly exaggerated, possibly from an empire building attempt by the Railways company.

        • Simon 1.1.5.2
          4 March 2025 at 6:37 am

          It had everything to do with size, the passenger entry and exit points for walking on were 4 stories high which had a direct corelation to very high infrastructure cost at each end.

      • Shane 1.1.6
        3 March 2025 at 6:58 pm

        They cancelled out of spite. They were never too big. They were designed around the geography presented under the proviso that the infrastructure was being replaced at the same time.
        The current infrastructure doesn’t meet the current code, is a little too small for our current ferries and is just needsreplacement

  2. bwaghorn 2
    1 March 2025 at 3:24 pm

    Could winston have stopped willis from canceling the original ferries?

    • tWig 2.1
      1 March 2025 at 6:08 pm

      Can't do a big save then, eh? I'm guessing Peters saw it would be a shitshow, and bided his time to step in to save the day ie revert to the original plan. But Nicky No-Boats is sunk.

  3. Patricia Bremner 3
    1 March 2025 at 5:11 pm

    I hope parents teachers and all are sending photos of the awful lunches to Seymour Luxon and Willis. Also send them to your local MP and keep complaining. If Seymour doubles down, we need to say we expect better for our money, better lunches more community involvement and less of our taxes going directly to corporates. This is beginning to be difficult for the "Arrogant little P….!!" so keep up the good work of showing up his shoddy choices and stupid comebacks. Sorry Micky this is under the wrong header.

    • tWig 3.1
      1 March 2025 at 6:20 pm

      Mountain Tui did a good facts summary of Seymour's claims regarding the lunches.

      'Public health nutritionists estimate that calories and size of the new lunches has been reduced by “at least” 1/3 as well – and the food is nutritionally opaque.'

      But the education ministry wouldn't know if nutrition is okay, because it fired its nutritionists. Seymour also failed to provide nutrition specs in the contracting process.

      The dept has also outsourced its quality assessment to the contractors, with no independent scrutiny. So the government has no figures of its own to test contract specs are being met.

  4. Mike the Lefty 4
    1 March 2025 at 6:10 pm

    Perhaps I misheard but I thought they said the new ferries would be scaled down models, so their rail-capability might not be the same as the old.

    Whatever, this one is going to make Seymour froth at the mouth. They work together real great this CoC, don't they. Each one trying to f.. the other up. Like infants in charge of building sites, always looking for the biggest crashes and bangs.

  5. Rodel 5
    1 March 2025 at 8:24 pm

    If I had to make a choice of DP it would be Winston. His rival is much too much under the control of the atlas cult.

  6. thinker 6
    1 March 2025 at 10:58 pm

    Reminds of the other Winston, the Churchill one – "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".

    My other point is it will send the obvious message that with a bit of nous, Willis could have changed the specs on the Hyundai order, instead of all the drama queen stuff.

    • powerman 6.1
      2 March 2025 at 7:51 am

      The cancellation of the fixed price ferry deal used shonky figures, so it will be interesting to see an independent assessment of any new deal in terms of both cost and efficiency.

  7. Champagne Socialist 7
    2 March 2025 at 10:14 am

    No. That is a weak article. The cost of the ferry debacle is probably going to exceed the original $3 billion for 2 larger, rail enabled ferries plus portside infrastructure upgrades.
    Now we are going to get 2 smaller ferries – I predict these will cost more than the original price for the larger ferries and no new portside infrastructure?
    This is an embarrassing cluster fuck and those involved need to be continuously reminded just how stupid the decision was.

    Yes NZ First may be necessary for the left block because the right are 100% laser focused on radicalizing and then attacking TPM (Duncan Garner is being used already as the point man on this).
    The right have a well thought out long term strategy to use ACT and Seymour to antagonize Maori as much as possible. To the point that they become politically isolated and untouchable as a coalition partner for the Labour.
    NZ First have always been economically left wing – more so than Labour on some policies. However, they are socially conservative which makes them push against progressives like the Greens and Labour.

    • Tony Veitch 7.1
      2 March 2025 at 11:18 am

      Re the cost of the ferries – Winston has already laid the groundwork for a "cheaper" deal by suggesting in the house the cost me be as much as $4 billion.

      So, $3.3 billion for smaller ferries – see, cheaper. Success!

    • AB 7.2
      2 March 2025 at 12:42 pm

      “The right have a well thought out long term strategy to use ACT and Seymour to antagonize Maori as much as possible. To the point that they become politically isolated and untouchable as a coalition partner for the Labour.”

      I suspect this is more of a strategic bonus rather than the central purpose. Seymour strikes me as a true believer in his Treaty Principles hijack. But it's a good point – Seymour may be able to use the Bill to provoke a radicalism from Maori that drives non-Maori voters to his side. A bit like the way that cynically making numerous false claims of anti-Semitism can provoke the real thing and justify the original lie.

  8. Brian Johnston 8
    5 March 2025 at 7:49 pm

    Peters and Marks bought the wrong planes for the Air force and now NZ is buying small ferries while the world buys larger. It is still a screw up.