Martin St resident Stan Hayman. Photo / Ben Fraser
Martin St resident Stan Hayman. Photo / Ben Fraser
A Rotorua resident has hit out after the council installed two drains and sealed a road only to rip up part of the road seven months later to adjust the flow to the drains.
But the council has defended the work, saying it was just the first layer of sealing, the process followed was not unusual and the extra work will not cost more.
Martin St resident Stan Hayman said a corner of the street had flooded for several years, but in his view, the work on the road at the beginning of the year had made it worse.
He said, in his opinion, the work on the drains, which he believed had been too high to capture stormwater, was not done properly at the time.
A retired road worker, Hayman said he had told a resealing worker the "levels for the kerbing were wrong".
Hayman also contacted the council before and after the resealing.
Hayman last month received a letter from the council stating maintenance contractors would be working on the corner, and on Wednesday contractors were on-site digging up the resealed road as part of their work to fix the issue.
Hayman said, in his opinion, the course of action was "absolutely not" how work paid for by ratepayers should be carried out.
Rotorua Lakes Council infrastructure and environmental solutions deputy chief executive Stavros Michael said the council had discussed Hayman's concerns with him in May.
Michael said "road foundation rehabilitation" was done on the street to replace failing road foundations, which he said was "usually because of gradual water saturation" that made the road susceptible to uneven settlement.
He said about 15m of kerbing was replaced with two new cesspit stormwater drains installed to prevent further water penetration and protect the new road foundations.
Workers removing the new road sealing on Martin St. Photo / Ben Fraser
"It is normal practice to allow new road foundations to settle under traffic loading before the first of two surface seal layers is applied and the first seal layer on Martin St was applied in April.
"In May, a staff member spoke with Mr Hayman regarding his concerns about surface stormwater not draining efficiently and ponding.
"My understanding is that it was explained that as this was the first seal layer, [the] council would monitor how well the new road foundation settled before considering whether any final level adjustments were required."
He said the second layer of road sealing for the street was part of this summer's sealing programme and as the road levels appeared not to have changed, the roading maintenance contractor was instructed to make adjustments around the two drains before the second seal layer is applied.
"Contracts for projects of this nature include a defects liability period of 12 months, during which time new works are monitored for any issues that need to be rectified before final contract payments are made.
"This protects [the] council from additional costs to rectify any defective work and at this stage, we do not anticipate any additional costs to [the] council with regards to the Martin St works."
