But the pain will ease soon - after a series of daytime and nighttime closures - as contractors zero in on opening a newroundabout and heading towards completing over three kilometres of work under budget.
The work at the heart of the disruption is part of a $20 million Napier-to-Hastings safety improvement project.
Waka Kotahi NZTA project manager Jacob Laird said at the site last week that everyone on the project was conscious of the inconvenience to motorists and, blessed with fine weather, was motivated to get the work done as soon as possible, incorporating maintenance which would otherwise have been done next year and created more disruption.
Fulton and Hogan’s Regan Mador-Leahy and NZTA project manager Jacob Laird. Photo / Warren Buckland
The first roundabout site work was done in the first week of December and layered asphalting of the roundabout, 1.1 metres higher than the level of the pre-existing laneway and situated what some have suggested is perilously closer to the coastline, started last Monday.
Stop/go traffic management at night will be in place from Sunday, March 3 to Monday, March 11 from 6pm to 5am, while contractors re-align the road to meet the new roundabout.
In addition, next week’s planned daytime closure of the Awatoto Rd intersection with SH51 will now go ahead from March 11 to 20. The road will be open as normal this week.
This week’s planned night work at the new roundabout on State Highway 51 has been delayed a week.
Instead, the intersection will be closed between 8am and 4pm daily from Monday, March 11 until Wednesday, March 20as contractors build the approach to the highway, including room for vehicles to queue without getting stranded on the tracks, ready for the roundabout to be fully operational by March 20.
During this closure period, access will remain for north and southbound traffic on the state highway.
North and southbound state highway traffic will be using the new roundabout and realigned roads from the morning ofMarch 11 while the new Awatoto Rd extension is expected to be opened just over a week later.
NZTA’s Laird said softer than anticipated aggregate has been discovered in the area where the road will be realigned to meet the roundabout.
He said the delays are unfortunate but it’s important the work is done now to ensure that material is removed and replaced with much firmer soil to future-proof the road.
The new road alignment further away from the railway line allowed more space, but design work also had to consider the risk of coastal inundation, with the construction of a solution to withstand future predicted storm surge at least until the year 2100, NZTA said.
The road north - the city and the hill of Mataruahau (Napier Hill) backdrop the roadworks on State Highway 51, now expected to be completed ahead of schedule and under budget. Photo / Warren Buckland
There’s also some road widening between Awatoto Rd and Ellison St/Marine Pde, to enable the addition of a wire-rope boundary on the inland side of the highway, beside which trees have figured in several of the tragedies and crashes over the years.
The project will be completed with off-road landscaping and flood-protection work. The road that is now as much a seafront tourist route as a busy highway will be celebrated with an opening ceremony later in the year.
Laird said a feature of the project was that “everyone” agreed it needed to happen, so it’s being done with the unique co-operation of two normally competing major contractors. Nationwide operator Fulton Hogan and Hawke’s Bay firm Tupore are working near 24/7 on-site and are at times managed almost to the minute as crews with different roles come and go and construction materials arrive in time for those next on deck.
“We are confident that installing the roundabout at this intersection will help protect all road users by lowering the frequency and severity of a crash,” an NZTA spokesperson said.
“Its design encourages motorists to slow down and reduces the number of points where people could potentially crash with another vehicle.”
Doug Laing is a senior reporter based in Napier with Hawke’s Bay Today, has 50 years of journalism experience in news gathering, including breaking news, sports, local events, issues, and personalities and first reported fatal crashes on State Highway 51 when it was State Highway 2, 1978-1979.
