NEAR FUTURE TRANSPORTING PEOPLE
Wellington Metlink are getting a bunch of new trains (18 it is believed) and carriages by 2025-26 and the Wellington Regional Council are going to allow private bus servicing again. All this means is that TransDec will increase the train services in the region to almost certainly include 10 minute-only gaps in its weekday scheduling and a more frequency at other times; a promised increase in public buses on the roads throughout the region.
These measures are taking into account the increased usage of public transport and the demand that will generate from new housing (such as town housing) and apartment blocks where vehicle ownership is or will be limited or non existent.
New housing areas are deliberately planned to take into account the lower expectation of vehicle-ownership and number of vehicles per household in the future.
As well, looking into the future a little bit further, there is the advance of the driverless vehicle which will allow people to hire vehicles on a trip by trip basis and not need to desire a privately owned vehicle parked or garaged. This will suit up with the advance of apartments which usually have restricted or no parking facilities and that of town houses with limited or no parking.
Capping this is the completion of cycle lanes to allow people to safely ride on the sides of roads and cater for the increased usage of cycling as a means of transportation and recreation.
Less need for vehicle ownership is the increasing permanency of people working from home instead of travelling to a work station and in the use of the internet for the ordering of and the delivering of supermarket products and all other items.
EMPIRE BUILDING TRUMP
So Donald Trump does not want to start any wars and is a peace maker.
And yet he is seriously seeking to annex the world's largest island, Greenland from Denmark, take over the Panama Canal from the sovereign country of Panama who have owned it since 1977 and even forthrightly suggesting that Canada ceases being a nation and become a state or series of states of the USA.
Greenland above everything else, harbours minerals vital for todays and tomorrows world and that is what probably attracts Trump most. His son is looking things over in Greenland as this thread is being produced. Climate change is also changing Greenland which despite its name is currently mainly covered in ice and snow all year round. Greenland has a population of 55,000.
Panama's major asset after tourism and services is the canal with a current revenue of $5 billion. It operates its shipping charges through an international organisation so that the USA gets an unbias deal for its ships etc that use the canal. Panama is a poor country on the improve and has a population of 4.5 million.
Denmark is a member of NATO. But Trump has threatened many times for the USA to pull out of this Europe-USA defence alliance and Greenland may be the straw that finally breaks the pact.
Canada is surrounded by the USA but it is so much unlike the USA and much more akin to Australia and NZ. In contrast to the USA, Canada is one of the happiest countries in the world and in total land area is the world's second largest.
NZ is going to come under the scrutiny of Trump and his henchmen/women. He will probably look to cut NZ away from its free trade arrangements with China with some kind of ultimatum.
New Year, New Questions You Won’t Solve!
I get smaller every time I take a bath.
What am I?
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