About / Welcome

Welcome,

This site was originally a Forum for family / friends to act as an alternative to using Facebook, however never achieved adoption and subsequently evolved into a personal general blog that it is today (serving as my personal self-hosted surrogate to Facebook).

As always, the views expressed here are my own and (unless otherwise explicitly stated) I do not purport that any of my views to be factually correct and opinions on any given topic are most certainly subjected to change. The intended audience of this blog is Family and friends and the content here should be regarded in the same vein as a series of personal public Facebook posts as opposed to a fully-fledged blog.

Regards,


Fergus Young
www.young.kiwi

 

About / Welcome

Existential

The world is changing, people are changing. I don’t necessarily agree with (nor understand) the way the world is currently headed, but other than continuing to express my views and concerns to elect representatives, “chewing the fat” with friends and family over the challenges facing society, participating in public consultations held by any government agency, discussing civics in a broader setting and continuing to partake in civic discourse, I otherwise feel powerless to effect any change as an individual.

In a way, it feels like some sort of generalized regression or devolution is slowly creeping in to the human species, but can’t put my finger on the root of it. Closer to home, It just seems some kind of ‘strangeness’ is happening. E.g. Everytime I head out, chances are very good that I will witness at least one incident of people losing their shit in a public freakout. People obviously under the influence smashing things, public shouting matches between groups of people, physical assault along with other public disorder incidents. In truth, it is beginning to feel like scenes out of a zombie movie at times as obvious drug use continues to increasingly grip society.

As my uncle said to me, you can’t save the world and you know what? He is 100% right. Going to be hunkering down, closing up a bit, sticking to my knitting as it were, and focussing more on taking care of the people who matter the most in my life. (Engaging Some sort of self defense mode as it were).

I’ve tried (and I shall continue to try – through continuing to engage in the civic process), but the reality is, there’s little else I can do and anything I do in the overall scheme of things has little impact on the prevailing.

I’m also anticipating in due course, I will probably eventually stop updating this site entirely. I’m seeing little point in continuing to write and spell out my thoughts here.

Existential

Travel itch still hasn’t returned (five years and counting)

I haven’t been able to get my desire to travel (overseas for leisure) back since COVID-19 – Essentially the desire to do so completely disappeared over the COVID lock downs and it never recovered.

In a nutshell, the potential enjoyment derived in my mind / grey matter doesn’t yet exceed the potential hassle / stress / cost at the moment. Given that it’s now been 5 years and the itch still hasn’t returned, I think it would be fair to say it may not return for a very long time (at least not to the same level as it was prior to COVID-19)

If there is a “purpose” to the travel, be in for work, volunteering, or other opportunity (that is not purely for leisure), then perhaps I can tack on a “leisure” component afterwards, but until that comes, will leave it be.

Travel itch still hasn’t returned (five years and counting)

Meta Platforms Inc. (Facebook)

The situation I feared almost two decades ago has materialized.

Facebook has begun and is already replacing having a website for a lot of businesses. Often when I do a search for a business, I find they now only have a Facebook page. The issue with this is that it effectively forces people to get a Facebook account to look at their page. (Scroll a handful of posts and FB now demands you login or create an account)

I will admit to buying shares in Facebook (now Meta Platforms Inc.) as a psychological analgesic to try and take the edge off of my high disdain towards the company. The stock price has now since quadrupled.

Despite my attempts to set up alternative self hosted platforms for friends to use (this site, peak.nz originally being one of them) to try and stop Face-borg taking over in this fashion, this was ultimately in vain. In hindsight and upon blunt reflection, I stood no chance.

The old web is dead. 15 years ago I was panned for being “Oh so pessimistic” for suggesting what has now eventuated today.

Admittedly, I really dislike the “new” Internet and have responded by drastically cutting down my personal use of it

Meta Platforms Inc. (Facebook)

Enquiry sent to KiwiRail regarding regular Auckland wide rail network shutdowns

Curious about the ongoing rail network shut down in Auckland (and admittedly, tired of the circuitous and slow Rail bus replacement services), ended up sending an Email to KiwiRail for more information including a possible timeline as to when we might see a conclusion to the Auckland wide Rail network shut downs that occur regularly during the weekends.

This is their response… (Published with KiwiRail’s permission)

Mōrena Fergus,

Thank you for contacting us.

Closures of rail lines are necessary to integrate and test City Rail Link systems, deliver a huge scale of other upgrade work to prepare for CRL and to deliver a backlog of overdue renewals and maintenance. The overdue work is the result of funding not keeping up with wear and tear from increasing rail traffic and a key factor in the requirement for regular lines closures. We know this is frustrating for passengers and neighbours to the rail network.

Auckland’s mixed network running both freight and passenger trains was originally not built for the kind of passenger frequency we’ve seen in recent years which will intensify after CRL opens. So it doesn’t yet operate like modern metro networks in other countries, which allow trains to run in some areas while other parts of the rail line are closed for upgrades or maintenance.

We are carrying out work which would normally take a decade but is being delivered in three to four years. This includes major rebuilds of the rail network foundations across the network (the Rail Network Rebuild), upgrades like the new third main line and electrification to Pukekohe, as well as new track infrastructure to provide more flexibility for train operations.

All of the upgrades, maintenance and renewals catch up work aims to lift the network to a modern metro standard running train services that are reliable and at a higher frequency carrying more passengers following the CRL opening. These line closures to upgrade the network will also enable maintenance to shift from the current reactive approach to proactive, resulting in fewer disruptions, more reliable services and fewer full network shutdowns in future.

Thanks,

In a nutshell. Rail network was never built to handle both freight and the volume of passenger services we see now and expect to see upon opening of the CRL. Historical lack of investment has been blamed. Lack of redundancy in the system (which I believe the 3rd Main line is aiming to alleviate).

That said, like many of our infrastructure projects in this country (road, rail and otherwise), still reckon there are places we could (drastically) improve on delivery (Both speed and quality wise). Whether the entire network needs to be shutdown as regularly as it has, I believe is still debatable.

Enquiry sent to KiwiRail regarding regular Auckland wide rail network shutdowns

New Zealand is in social and economic trouble

…If we don’t manage to change tact and turn this nation around.

“Oh it’s not that bad, other countries have it worse than us”

It may not be that bad now. But the trajectory together with the longer term pattern isn’t looking at all favorable.

Key issues facing our nation include…

  • Housing Affordability – Houses in New Zealand are ludicrously overpriced and it’s locking out many of our younger and most productive citizens who become despondent and leave New Zealand. I even say this being a landlord myself. We as a country have broken our social contract with our working population. I acutely see the negative impact this is having on our society and our economy in the longer run. I am deeply angered by our governments (past and present) for their failure and lack of willingness to tackle this issue. Sadly during the run up to last election’s I found few politicians cared despite me emphatically reaching out explaining why it’s an issue and asking what they are going to do about it
  • Proliferating illicit drug use (as reported by way of wastewater analysis) and social issues that this brings with it including increasing crime.
  • Low productive output – As one example of many, It’s magnitudes more expensive to build the same critical infrastructure in New Zealand than it is in other countries. We regularly see the waste when we drive through road works that take for ever to complete and see no one is there working a lot of the times. Examples of this include Waikato expressway which seems to require perpetual repair and the City Rail Link that can never quite get to opening stage (to the point revenue train services can run on it)
  • We don’t have a lot to export that is valuable. Our main exports are Diary and Tourism which frankly aren’t high value exports.

I fear at this stage, if we don’t tackle the above issues, all we will become is nothing more than a larger version of our Pacific Island neighbours.  We’re already seeing gradual social decline, increasing division and a slow erosion of what made New Zealand a great place to live.

New Zealand is in social and economic trouble

COVID-19 finally got me

Update 5th February 2024: Have now tested negative. Apart from sleeping for much longer and a dry cough, symptoms are largely gone. Overall, for me, felt like a longer acting but milder version of the flu.

Rapid Antigen Test Cassette with both the Control and Test lines visible indicated a COVID positive result
Positive COVID-19 Rapid Antigen Test

Symptoms initially appeared mid last week sometime but daily Rapid Antigen testing only began showing positive 4-5 days after symptoms first appeared.

So far symptoms have been rather mild (so far). More like a mild / low grade influenza with mild fever for only a day and a tickly / itchy throat for the rest of it,

That said, it’s appears to affect everyone differently and quite vastly so. Have had APAC Development team members at work being knocked out for weeks at a time.

COVID-19 finally got me

This system is broken – House values vs wages

You know this system is buggered when just a single investment propery alone (e.g an average 3 bedroom stand alone / single family house) one happens to own is appreciating in value faster than what one earns in their main job. And that is before considering the taxman coming to take his take off of my salary.

Sadly, none of the politicians I spoke to in the lead up to our last elections gave a hoot. National Party candidates in particular – they didn’t seem to care about the social impact of house price speculation and in fact seemed to be incredulous that I would vote against my own financial self interest.

Yeah well, what pride is there to live in such a socially and economically divided society? We’ve already long since lost our our egalitarian identity and we are already losing our social cohesion.

This system is broken – House values vs wages

Auckland Funnel Cloud

Funnel cloud spotted from Grand Drive, Remuera as I was nearing home yesterday. First time I’ve ever seen such a thing with my own eyes. Thankfully it never developed into a fall blown twister / tornado.

Funnel cloud formation coming out from dark clouds against the blue sky behind
Funnel cloud spotted in Auckland

Admittedly, I was initially concern that it was headed for my home. Turns out the thing was quite a bit away fortunately (out in the Harbour). The formation did resemble almost precisely the tornadoes I’ve been repeatedly seeing in many of my apocalyptic dreams.

Auckland Funnel Cloud

Ti-Rakau Drive and Trugood Drive Traffic light issue

Reported this issue to Auckland Transport. With “return to office” mandates and the lack of Travel choice in much of the East Tamaki Employment zone, thought this should get looked into.

Saw traffic backing up along Ti-Rakau Drive (West bound traffic) and all the way back to Botany and up along Harris Road as well (when returning back home from the In-office day on Wednesday)

Update: Auckland Transport have since come back to me and confirmed the issue and have kindly made adjustments to the phasing along with thanking me for report this.

From what AT have implied, this was the first report of this they have received. As far as I know, this issue has existed for months so it did leave me wondering why no one else has report this? Even if it’s to inquire if the current programming / phasing of the lights are correct. (This isn’t the first time this has happened, are people just assuming someone else will pipe up and report these issues?)

That said, with the Trugood lights now “fixed”, the congestion will likely be moved further down (e.g Ti Rakau / Revees Rd interchange) so overall travel time savings for my route will probably only amount to around a few minutes.

Ti-Rakau Drive and Trugood Drive Traffic light issue