Puhoi Highway $1.3b And More

in Featured General Motorways by Jon C — November 17, 2010 at 7:08 pm | 5 comments

The Holiday Highway is certain to cost more than the $1.3b estimated back in 2009.

Today, while announcing the route, NZTA shied away from putting a figure on the cost - but transport minister Steven Joyce said:  ”The challenge for this project is not so much the funding but getting the design, consultation and consenting processes all done from a standing start.”

NZTA would only say this on funding: “ The estimates for the Puhoi to Warkworth section are still being developed as part of the ongoing project investigation and will not be finalised until the route is confirmed. However, the budget for the Puhoi to Wellsford project is $1.3 billion (2009 dollars).”

The business case for the Britomart CBD loop will put the figure for that job in the region of $2b.

NZTA wants the Holiday highway completed by 2020 but adds “NZTA will seek to accelerate the programme wherever possible.”

It says the route announced today is based on seven months of in-depth specialist work assessing environmental, social and engineering inputs including the extensive feedback from the first round of consultation in June and July this year.

The route is the result of a three step process.

1. The project team developed a long list of options in the project area based on desk top study of constraints. These included environmental (streams, DOC reserves), social (Puhoi historic village) and Engineering (terrain, road geometry). These were mainly clustered around the existing SH1 but some went as far west as the Auckland to Whangarei railway line.
2. The team reduced this to a short-list based on a series of criteria covering areas such as transport, environmental, social and economic factors.
3. Once the short-list was established further investigations were undertaken including some walkovers of property and public consultation to come up with an indicative route.

With 55 to 60 properties going to be affected, public information days will be held in Warkworth and Puhoi starting this weekend. But, as it was with Waterview, it will be anxious uncertain time for those property owners.

No land will be bought yet as the route may still change and the projected route is not definite enough to confirm exact boundaries affected.

“We are only in the first phase of the project and have yet to fix where the route will be and exactly how much land will be needed, ” says NZTA on the issue today.

“We have prepared maps for landowners whose properties are crossed by the indicative route which show how much land might be affected. But this is just a rough indication. It is possible that the route might move off their properties or require more or less land following the consultation and further studies.”

The info sessions are on:

• This Saturday 10am-2pm – Warkworth Primary School, Hill Street,
• Warkworth Tuesday 23 November 4pm-7.30pm – Old Masonic Hall, Baxter Street
• Puhoi Thursday 25 November 3.30pm – 7.30pm – Puhoi Sports Club
• Warkworth Sunday 28 November 10-2pm – Warkworth Primary School, Hill Street, Warkworth

The consultation will run till 28th January 2011.

NZTA says it is not consulting on a route north of Warkworth because the terrain and geology through the Dome Valley and around Wellsford is very difficult for road building. “We need to do more work to develop the best value-for-money solution for this section of the project.  Both the steep land through Dome Valley and the flatter land around Wellsford have their issues. It is important we have a good understanding of this before we select an indicative route for this section.”

To allow NZRA to start without slowing progress with the Puhoi to Warkworth section, it spilt the project into two sections.

One of the contentious issues is access.

NZTA says on the question of why the Warkworth access will be to the north of the town that the access is close to the town centre providing easy use for local residents and visitors using the existing SH1. Through traffic will be shifted away from Hill Street improving its operation.

The proposed access allows for a potential Matakana link road to the eastern beaches, however, this will need to be discussed further with Auckland Council. There is access to the Woodcock’s Road industrial and commercial areas via Auckland Council’s planned western collector. This could be enhanced with a potential new link road from the bypass to Hudson Road, however, this will need to be discussed further with Auckland Counci. Increases in traffic on Woodcocks Road by the secondary school and on Hill Street by the primary school are avoided.

As far as the Hill Street Upgrade project is concerned, traffic will travel in and out of Warkworth from the north through a tie-in to the existing state highway. The agency says the Hill Street intersection improvements currently underway are still required to help with the intersection performance until the new highway is in place.  Once the new highway is built, some further minor upgrades to the Hill Street intersection will help direct the changed traffic flows.

Traffic to the eastern beaches will then turn left at the Hill Street intersection.

The decision on an access near Puhoi/Mahurangi West required further work,  including understanding the future for the area as set out in the Auckland plan currently under development.

Tags: NZTA Puhoi Wellsford