Our roads are deteriorating faster than we can repair them.

This is because the roading budget is stretched due to multiple storms, more heavy freight vehicles and rising construction costs.

So we need to repriortise where we spend our limited budget, to make sure our network is more resilient to the impacts of climate change and natural disasters.

We asked for feedback on the roading network challenges and what's most important to you. We asked for feedback from 5 March - 16 April.

What are the challenges?

What we need to do

We need to plan beyond recovery, for a more resilient network

Maintaining all our roads and fixing every pothole is unaffordable. So we're reviewing our extensive 1899km local road network, by:

  • looking at where to invest in vital routes
  • where we need to build stronger roads
  • where we can reduce maintenance on less-used roads
  • where we can close or reduce use of selected roads seasonally or when vulnerable
  • explore opportunities where we can partner with industry for road maintenance
  • retire identified 'unviable' roads from our network, reducing our overall maintenance obligations.

We also know our region has 75% of New Zealand’s worst geology for landslides and erosion. As a result, our roads struggle to receive sufficient maintenance, even with assisted funding, given they are some of the most remote, vast, and largely unused in the country.

Future weather events will continue to put pressure on our roads, and significant changes are needed in how we approach maintenance.

Changes to levels of service

Levels of service (LoS) describes the performance of the road network as experienced by road users:

  • Higher LoS: These roads are wider and straighter, with smooth sealed surfaces and good drainage. They tend to be busier roads, often found in urban areas.
  • Lower LoS: Maintained to a lesser standard, these roads are often unsealed and require more care and skill to navigate. Many rural roads are in this category.
  • Very Low LoS: These roads may only be usable by all-wheel-drive (AWD) vehicles.
Urban and rural township roads

For the urban areas including rural townships with sealed roads, some roads may only be chip seal rather than smooth asphalt.

Rural roads

For rural roads, we may transition sealed roads to unsealed.

Levels of service may decrease and reopening roads after a significant weather event could take longer.

The outcome of the review

We will:

  • assess where future roading resilience risks are the highest. We're mapping all the risks for roads including geology, land use, and how vital the route is.
  • produce a list of roads showing the proposed category for the level of maintenance.
  • outline an affordable and prioritised future investment programme. This will set out where roading resilience funding will be spent.

All this will be summarised in a business case so we can apply to NZTA to building future roading resilience improvements.

Tell us your preference

Kōrero mai - have your say

We had 5 questions with options for each challenge, and asked for your preference. We also asked to share your views on those challenges.

Feedback closed Wednesday 16 April.

Q1. We don't have enough funding to maintain all sealed roads

Which approach do you prefer?

We don't have the funding to maintain all sealed roads to the historical level of service we would like. Currently 750km of our rural network is sealed. Due to funding limitations, we need to reduce this by around 150km (20%) to make the renewals programme sustainable. Should we:

This poll has concluded.

  • Overtime, revert around 150km of poor-quality, low-traffic-volume rural sealed roads back to unsealed roads to afford maintenance for the more important rural sealed roads.
    70% (121 votes)
  • Keep patching all sealed roads for a period, while accepting a lower level of service for all sealed rural roads.
    30% (52 votes)
Total Votes: 173

Q2. Bridges across our network

What's your preference?

We have 413 bridges to maintain, with 42 requiring repairs after the cyclones and 7 needing total rebuilds. We're under pressure to repair and replace bridges in remote areas of the network with low traffic volumes. On average, a new bridge cost about $10m just to install. Note: This doesn't impact the work we're doing on funding to replace the cyclone destroyed bridges. Should we:

This poll has concluded.

  • Replace and repair existing bridges destroyed or damaged by future events on low use roads.
    41% (65 votes)
  • Invest more money in bridges that are built in the right places and provide a valuable service to the community to increase resilience and lower risk of destruction in future events.
    59% (93 votes)
Total Votes: 158

Q3. Reduction in funding for future weather events

What's your preference?

The government is signalling reductions in emergency funding for future weather events. This change will fundamentally affect our decision-making around these events, as well as our maintenance practices and prioritisation. In some situations, the viability of roads could be questioned. With a 10-15% annual funding reduction to address, we need to prioritise maintenance and investment in areas that reduce the impacts of weather events. This means focusing on proactive asset improvements, such as culverts, rather than waiting for roads to fail as a result of severe weather events, which would then have to be repaired at a greater cost. Should we:

This poll has concluded.

  • Continue to maintain the current road network as it is, and address failure as it occurs as reactive emergency works on the basis that NZTA may continue to contribute towards the repair bill.
    35% (53 votes)
  • Invest more money in proactive asset management which may increase Council rates but reduce the risk of road and bridge failure.
    65% (99 votes)
Total Votes: 152

Q4. Rural roads during bad weather

What's your preference?

For many years, some rural roads were temporarily closed when there was a risk of significant damage during bad weather. More recently, we have instead attempted to keep all roads open at all times, even if this results in damage from heavy vehicles. Should we:

This poll has concluded.

  • Continue to keep all roads open to all traffic and accept there will be damage (mainly from heavy vehicles) which will cost significant money to maintain and repair.
    11% (17 votes)
  • Work with relevant industries that use heavy vehicles, to plan activities around the potential for temporary road closures during bad weather.
    89% (141 votes)
Total Votes: 158

Q5. Expect more hazards from climate change

What's your preference?

Some roads are not well aligned for current or future use and or are being exposed to more and more hazards from climate change. Should we:

This poll has concluded.

  • Do nothing and wait for failure and eventually abandon road.
    5% (8 votes)
  • Relocate road with a bypass if there's enough money.
    68% (111 votes)
  • Stay and build in protection if there's enough money and continue to live with risk.
    27% (44 votes)
Total Votes: 163

If you would like to provide further feedback on your preferences