Time-of-use charging

Auckland’s congestion problem

Congestion in Auckland is a real problem with real life consequences. By 2026, congestion will cost Auckland $2.6 billion. This is factoring:

the cost of lost time
impacts like reduced business investment and consumer spending.

For more information, download Auckland's Cost of Congestion, January 2025 (PDF, 2.3MB).

Auckland has some of the worst traffic in New Zealand and Australia. Our commuters lose an average of 66 hours each year stuck in traffic at peak times (the equivalent of two and a half days). The time we spend sitting in traffic is time we're not working, learning or spending time with whānau.

All of this creates stress on commuters, business, productivity, the environment and our quality of life. As Auckland continues to grow, our congestion problem is only projected to get worse.

AT’s role is to improve, invest in and manage the transport system so that Aucklanders can travel to the places they want to, safely, reliably and in a way that meets their needs.

Download a visual summary of Auckland's cost of congestion (PDF, 1.9MB)

About Time of Use Charging

Time of Use Charging is a form of congestion charging that encourages us to think more about how we travel – whether that's taking public transport, carpooling, or driving outside peak hours. It can be targeted to areas, such as the centre of a city, or it can be applied to individual congested roads like a motorway, or it can be a mix of both.

Time of Use Charging has been rolled out successfully in cities around the world. We’re investigating how to deliver a scheme that has Auckland’s issues and context in mind.

How Aucklanders will benefit from this

Charging road users during congested times of the day encourages people to change when and how they travel or avoid unnecessary trips altogether. This puts less pressure on the road network and can improve overall traffic flow.

For those that pay the charge, roads are less congested, making journeys faster and more reliable.
Time of Use Charging is based on the idea that a small change in travel behaviour has the potential to make a big difference on overall road network performance. As we optimise demand for Auckland’s limited road space, the volume of people and goods moving through the network can increase, improving the efficiency of our existing road infrastructure.

Previous studies

The work we’re doing now builds on The Congestion Question investigation, which considered whether there’s a case for introducing congestion pricing in Auckland.

The Congestion Question recommended a city centre cordon as the first step before expanding into strategic corridors by sub-regional area.

Legislation and initial technical work

In late 2024, Parliament released draft legislation for the Land Transport Management (Time of Use Charging) Amendment Bill (opens in a new tab), which would enable Auckland Council to propose Time of Use Charging schemes in Auckland. The Bill is expected to be passed into law later in 2025.

Read Auckland Council's submission on the Parliament website (opens in a new tab).

In April 2025, the Auckland Council Group provided a submission on the Bill emphasising the importance of local decision making, the need for scheme revenue to fund complementary measures including additional public transport services, and the importance of more flexible mitigation measures.

Throughout 2024 and 2025, Auckland Council and Auckland Transport have undertaken an initial phase of technical work. This work enabled the narrowing of potential scheme options for further consideration. It also considered policy and operational settings and informed the Auckland Council Group submission on draft legislation.

Download our latest programme update (PDF, 330KB)

The main findings from the initial phase of work have been summarised in the:

Key technical and background documents from the initial phase of work are:

These documents reflect initial work and will likely be overtaken by final legislation or subsequent work occurring over the second part of 2025 and beyond.

Next steps

Additional technical work refining and assessing potential scheme options will be undertaken over the latter half of 2025.

Legislation enabling potential Time of Use Charging is expected to be adopted by Parliament before the end of 2025. Auckland Council will then be advised on a recommended way forward, including public and stakeholder engagement. The specific approach will depend on the process and governance arrangements set out in the final legislation.

Final decisions on whether to proceed with a scheme are yet to be made and will be subject to public and stakeholder engagement.

As the programme continues, we will get input from Aucklanders to give us a better understanding of your views.

Last updated 17/07/2025