Prime Minister, Rt Hon Chris Hipkins and Associate Minister of Transport, Hon Kiri Allan, to mark the completion of the Pūhoi to Warkworth section of Ara Tūhono, and Te Honohono ki Tai Road in Warkworth.
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has officially opened the $880 million Pūhoi to Warkworth motorway this morning - a project opposed and mocked by Labour as a “holiday highway” and part of National’s “Roads of National Significance” programme.
Hipkins was accompanied by Associate Transport Minister Kiri Allan at the ceremony to mark the completion of the new section of SH1 and the $62m Te Honohono ki Tai Matakana Link Rd that avoids Warkworth’s infamous Hill St intersection.
The Herald understands the motorway will be open to traffic by early next week. A precise time and date is not being made public to prevent traffic disruption.
After cutting the ribbon on the new motorway, Hipkins said it was wrong of Labour to call it the ‘holiday highway’.
He said it was not wrong to criticise all of the road funding for the Roads of National Significance and away from maintenance and local roads.
“The reality is we need to do both. We need to invest in new roads but also make sure we are maintaining the existing roads,” Hipkins said.
Chris Hipkins called the new motorway a “fantastic undertaking” during the opening on Friday. Photo / Dean Purcell
The Prime Minister said the Government is committed to the next section of SH1 north from Warkworth to north of Wellsford, but said there are still decisions around timing and funding.
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency has no plans to progress the next stage north this decade.
Hipkins said SH1 linking Auckland to Northland is the “main lifeline, the main highway we need to make sure we are investing in it”.
Asked if National should be opening the motorway today when they started it and Labour criticised it, Hipkins said “and we funded it”.
“There’s lots of people who will want to claim credit for this but the fundamental, big important question is let’s get these projects moving”.
Hipkins called the new motorway a “mammoth undertaking” and a “fantastic undertaking”.
He said it was a key part of the Northland to Auckland corridor and would unlock and boost the local economy.
This is the most significant new road since Transmission Gully, Which has transformed travel in and out of Wellington, Hipkins said.
Today’s opening ceremony began with a dawn ceremony by Ngãti Manuhiri and Ngãti Rango who are the tangata whenua of the area with the support of their Ngãti Whãtua relations’.
About 120 people attended the blessing on a procession along the route, stopping at each of the five bridges for a karakia.
A procession of vehicles has started driving the 18.5km route from Puhoi to Warkworth where the Prime Minister will officially mark the end of construction.
Site co-ordinator Lola Korewha who is driving the lead vehicle said: “It’s very impressive. I’m very proud.”
Korewha, who has been working on the project for five and a half years added: “I have thoroughly enjoyed every moment. I love the family vibe we have here.”
Ara Tuhono Puhoi to Warkworth motorway State Highway. Photo / Supplied
The motorway has taken more than six years to build by the NX2 joint venture between Fletcher Building and Spanish construction firm Acciona, who under a private-public partnership will operate and maintain the road for 25 years.
The 18.5km new section of SH1 was initially due to open in the summer of 2021/22 and then at Queen’s Birthday weekend last year, but the impact of Covid pushed out the opening date by a further 12 months.
When the new motorway opens it will chop 11 minutes off the drive north and provide motorists with a safer journey to the windy and mostly single-lane road it replaces.
The drive begins with the impressive Arawhiti ki Ōkahu viaduct after the Johnstones Hill tunnels.
A couple of kilometres up the road at the Pūhoi turnoff spans a second viaduct before the four-lane motorway begins an undulating and curved path following the natural contours of the land as much as possible.
Halfway along the route are a spectacular series of steep cuts of Pakiri sedimentary sandstone and siltstone up to 65m high in thin horizontal layers and brick-like patterns laid over with wire mesh.
At the halfway point sits the steel Moir Hill bridge spanning two of the giant cuts, the steepest stretch of the road with a third, crawler lane each way for trucks and other slow vehicles.
The Puhoi to Warkworth motorway follows an undulating route. Photo / NZME
A prettier picture emerges towards Warkworth at the 75m long Arawhiti Pua Ngahere (Kauri Eco Viaduct) crossing a stream to a kauri forest and other significant native trees, almost within touching distance of vehicles.
When a four-lane motorway between Pūhoi and Wellsford was promoted by the last National Government, Labour’s transport spokesman Phil Twyford derided it as a low-value “holiday highway”.
He said Labour would postpone it and spend a fraction of the cost fixing accident black spots along the route.
Former Labour leader Phil Goff also promised to shelve the project indefinitely at the 2011 election. Goff lost the election to John Key, who went on to turn the first sod of the Pūhoi to Warkworth section in December 2016.
Ahead of today’s ceremony, Kiri Allan called it a “legacy project” and an exciting day for local communities and Northland.
Associate Transport Minister Kiri Allan. Photo / Andrew Warner
“This route is vital for the economy and will provide more predictable, consistent and reliable travel and better access to markets in Northland and to export ports at Auckland and Tauranga. That’s important for businesses to be able to plan their logistics,” she told the Herald yesterday.
Neither Labour nor National has publicly committed to building the next stage of Ara Tūhono from Warkworth to Wellsford any time soon.
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency has the route and resource consents for the Warkworth to the north of Wellsford motorway that bypasses crash-plagued Dome Valley but does not anticipate any works starting on the corridor this decade.
National transport spokesman Simeon Brown said SH1 from Auckland to Whangarei is a critical corridor that needs greater investment, but the phasing and timing of any further work will be outlined in the party’s transport policy for October’s elections.
In 2020, the Labour Government announced it would build a four-lane motorway from Whangarei to Port Marsden costing $692 million, but 18 months later scrapped it for safety improvements only.
Brown today hit back at Labour on the eve of the opening, saying Hipkins and former Transport Minister Michael Wood were among those opposed to National’s efforts to begin the construction.
“But Labour ministers will now shamelessly celebrate the completion of yet another project identified, consented and started under the former National government, as if it was their idea.
Brown said National was proud of the investment they made in the Pūhoi to Warkworth motorway under the Roads of National Significance programme and would “continue their track record of investing in important roading infrastructure” if elected in October.
“We welcome the opening of this motorway and the many benefits it will bring to Auckland and Northland commuters.”
Bernard Orsman is an Auckland-based reporter who has been covering local government and transport since 1998. He joined the Herald in 1990 and worked in the parliamentary press gallery for six years.
