Michael Pascoe writes:

Investors in Sydney’s Cross
City Tunnel look like becoming a very cross little mob after usage
plunged yesterday as soon as the $3.56 toll was reinstated. The 44%
crash in patronage to just 12,406 vehicles confirms that in this
project, everyone is a loser.

The SMH
has the story, with the inevitable pointless calls by the state
opposition for the state government to immediately reclaim the roads
and renegotiate the contract.

The loser operators, CrossCity
Motorway, should be so lucky. In fact, the losers who invested in this
project must be praying for Iemma to be so stupid – but they probably
haven’t donated anywhere near as much as the property developers and
hotels and clubs to the NSW ALP. The fact is that the contracts are
watertight and would pay off very handsomely for the investors if Iemma
tries to change them.

Motorists’ only hope is that the
semi-boycott of the tunnel lasts long enough and is severe enough for
CrossCity to ask to be bought out. If the investors could just get
their money back, they might be happy to fade away – but they won’t
even hint of that as long as anyone is suggesting the government should
move first.

It’s worth maintaining a little perspective on how
the mess was created in the first place – particularly as the ratbag
mindset remains regularly on public display. This tunnel and the road
changes were conceived back when Bob Carr was Premier and Frank Sartor
ran City Hall. Both had a vision of Sydney without cars, or at least as
few as possible – a vision that seems to live on with Clover Moore.

One
thing the former state Treasurer, Michael Egan, managed to get right
back in 1999 was that this self-righteous band of pin-brains should be
jailed. Check the Hansard exchange with a loopy Green MP trying to justify the imposition.

Perhaps
it’s time for drivers to reclaim the streets. Given the tolerance of
the pedal pushing traffic terrorists, perhaps it’s time for a convoy
of cars to blockade the Iemma and his gang of ne’er-do-wells inside
their respective homes for an extra hour or so every morning. I’m sure
they won’t mind.