Ramp signals to ease congestion during Christmas rush

Photo / Christine Cornege

Roading improvements to assist traffic flows through two chokepoints - in Auckland and Thames Valley - will be in place for the Christmas rush.

The Transport Agency has announced that ramp signal traffic lights will start operating on Monday on what was supposed to have been a seamless motorway-to-motorway connection through Manukau.

It also says construction of a two-lane roundabout which will eventually link a replacement Kopu Bridge to State Highway 26 between Thames and Paeroa is substantially complete, ensuring roadworks will not get in the way of holiday traffic.

Although no ramp signals were initially planned for the new $220 million link between the Southwestern and Southern motorways in Auckland, the agency decided in October to install lights after motorists complained that merging traffic was causing delays of up to 40 minutes in evening commuter peaks.

The agency coned off one of two lanes carrying traffic from the Southwestern Motorway to ease the bottleneck while it rushed through an order for more of the controversial ramp signals common around Auckland.

Agency northern highways manager Tommy Parker said the highway layout where the signals would operate was also being widened from two to three lanes to increase the number of vehicle able to merge with the Southern Motorway.

"We believe ramp signals are the most effective way to manage merging traffic," he said. "They have the double advantage of improving safety and smoothing the flow of traffic as the two motorways join."

Mr Parker said traffic had settled down since the lane-rationing began, and some drivers had reverted to old arterial routes.

Even so, his organisation was considering bringing forward a proposal to widen the Southern Motorway between Manukau and Papakura to ease congestion further.

But Papakura commuter Richard Brown says delays in the area remain intolerable, particularly on Friday afternoons.

He said it took him 80 minutes to drive from central Auckland to Takanini from 5pm last Friday, and 30 minutes on the same day of the previous week to travel 4km from the Southwestern Motorway's Cavendish Drive interchange to the Southern Motorway.

In the Waikato, Transport Agency project services manager Bryce Carter said the completion of the new roundabout associated with the Kopu Bridge replacement project would ensure that roadworks would not slow down holiday traffic heading to and from the Coromandel Peninsula.

Although drivers are still likely to face delays waiting to cross the existing one-lane bridge at peak times, traffic will be able to use straight-through routes on either side of the roundabout.

But the roundabout cannot operate as a full intersection until the new bridge and approach roads are completed by mid-2012 for $47 million.

Mr Carter said completion of the roundabout meant the end of next year would be free for the construction of 2.5km of approach roads on either side of the new two-lane bridge.