Repairs to Cooks Tooth Rd cost $1.3m after storm

Sections of Cooks Tooth Rd damaged in last month's winter storm. Photo / Supplied

About $1.3 million in damage was caused to the district's roads in last month's severe storm.

The storm on July 13 and 14 - which dumped snow down to low levels with heavy rains for more than 24 hours, causing slips, washouts and surface flooding - damaged more than 200 sites across the district's roading network.

The damage was detailed at last week's CHB District Council finance and planning committee, which was told council's share of the repair and clean-up operation would be $470,668.

While not as severe as the damaged caused by the April 2011 storm that hit CHB coastal areas, land transport manager Shawn McKinley told councillors the cost of the damage at this point was still about $1.3 million.

"This was not like 2011, which cost $9.5m - but this was across about 250 to 260 sites and the damage caused is restricting the full road usage and negatively impacting movement of freight."

Councillors agreed with his recommendation that repair costs come out of council's $551,883 Land Transport Emergency Fund.

Speaking ahead of the meeting, McKinley advised motorists to be alert for changed traffic conditions as contractors started today on weeks of repair work on a number of rural roads.

"Crews from both [council contractors] Downers and Higgins will be out all over the network, so there will be a lot of temporary traffic management and stop-go conditions," he said.

Cooks Tooth Rd on the way to Porangahau was also in need of repairs in number of places, he said.

"On Cooks Tooth Rd there are two or three areas where we are going to have to design and put in retaining walls that will be under stop-go and single lane [conditions]," Mr McKinley said

McKinkey said Titoko Rd at Omakere would be reduced to a single lane while a wash-out on one side of the bridge was repaired.

"We lost a fair amount of material so that will take a month or so [to fix]," he said.

Due to subsidence of the road embankment, Windsor Rd in Waipawa would also be reduced to one lane while a retaining wall was constructed.

"We've already moved a contractor in there, so that one will be five weeks," he said.
Emergency repairs to Waitotara Bridge on Mangarorapa Rd, would take six weeks while a retaining wall was constructed, he said.

The meeting also that Hawke's Bay Regional Council's successful prosecution of CHB council over exceedances at its Waipawa wastewater had cost the local authority $130,000 to date. This was on top of the $100,000 of work to be completed as per an enforcement order issued by the Environment Court.