I have three of the one in the bottom right.

Great tongue game as a result but that's about it.

Or just realise most of the world doesn't give a shit about American history any more than Americans care about the treaty of Waitangi.

Moana is literally ocean.

This way you can call her bug or something else cute

Very good point

Perception. If a company isn't on the leading edge we don't consider them the best.

Regardless if you use them or not, if Google didn't touch AI but Edge did you would believe edge is more advanced.

I should call her....

I went of treaty of Waitangi, like how America was "founded" at the declaration of independence.

Flipside, I cant exactly say us Maori were developing a strong road network, industrial base and civil structures now can I?

Backwards- if you want to cover areas your network needs to be the size to cover it. Its much more comparatively expensive when you have 3 people riding each route rather than 18.

You're correct on main lines, however you can also run larger busses.

You may want to take 2 seconds to realize the US isn't the only place in the world.

Closer to teabag

I didn't say I don't consider roads as critical infrastucture, I specifically said "mega roads", i.e new multi lane motorways that are a waste of money because they will encourage more driving, more sprawl and make traffic even worse in the long run (and I imagine local roads will deteriorate as they did the last time this happened).

Unfortunately the time to deal with the alternative here was 30 years ago. We aren't a 15 min city (none if them are) and changing this will take decades.

Three waters, the ferries, state housing, public transport are all better options right now that are woefully underfunded and in fact actively sabotaged by this govt.

Agreed, moving on.

The "we don't have the density" argument is often pulled out against funding public transport and it's unfounded. We're one of the most urbanised countries in the world. We could absolutely build more PT if we chose to, we've had far more extensive networks in the past than what we currently do.

Sydney has 6 million people compared to Auckland 1.2., Melbourne 5 with similar land area. If you look at % then yes, look at people per sqkm we are no where close.

Overall, saying what's happening is a symptom is just an attempt to claim what's happening right now is inevitable imo. Different choices can be made that would be far less damaging, they'd be positive even and actually address the underlying problems you highlight instead of this "better things aren't possible" fatalism.

Yes, better choices can be made, they will improve the country in the long run, but people struggling now get to vote. Balanced books get votes on confidence, ease of lifestyle and business as usual get votes, getting kicked out if my car and more regulations lose elections.

A low GDP per capita economy

Still higher than some countries who manage much more. We beat Korea, Japan, Spain, hell, we edge out France.

My numbers are a bit outdated (pre covid), I thought NZ was around 80k, France sat closer to 1.2 million.

Interesting point - you also picked countries with significantly higher population in close proximity to major trade routes and markets.

significant logistics chains and costs

Good thing we are getting some new Toyota Carolla Ferrys to help make those logistic chains better!

Its a shame they love to drag the chain, so to speak...

low nation ownership of productive assets and banks

The same party that is now claiming we need austerity, also sold of several of those productive assets.

Oh, make no mistake im not supporting national in any of this. Just stating the issue and where the country is.

lack of economies of scale from infrastructure spread over a wide area with low population

Fair. I think most of our main infra is pretty consolidated, but a large portion of our economy is based on farming, which by it's very nature, is spread out.

Agreed- unfortunately low value bulky goods that fetch global price means it sucks for us consumers.

surprisingly lack of accountability for project over runs…

On this we agree. I also think that cancelling good projects, simply because it's the "other sides" project, should also have accountability.

Couldn't agree more. 4 year election cycle, cut the crap and let's get this country better.