This page relates to the 2024-27 National Land Transport Programme.
An update to reflect the Government Policy Statement on land transport (GPS) 2024 is under way.
This page describes the local road and state highway maintenance activity classes and provides links to road maintenance, operations and renewal programme requirements, work category definitions and information, and prioritisation of these programmes.
There are two activity classes:
The definitions for these activity classes in the Government Policy Statement on land transport (GPS) 2024 are:
State highway maintenance:
- Investment in the ongoing maintenance, operations, and renewal of the state highway network to deliver an appropriate level of service across all modes
- Urgent response to transport network disruptions to restore an appropriate level of service.
Local road maintenance:
- Investment in the ongoing maintenance, operations, and renewal of the local road network to deliver an appropriate level of service across all modes
- Urgent response to transport network disruptions to restore an appropriate level of service.Government Policy Statement on land transport 2024
Government Policy Statement on land transport 2024(external link)
Our definitions for the components in these programmes are:
We (NZTA as investor) expect that investments from the local road and state highways maintenance activity classes will contribute to results sought by the government.
Government expectations by activity class (webpage yet to come)
For us to consider a road maintenance activity for inclusion in the 2024–27 National Land Transport Programme (NLTP), this activity must:
Once an activity is included in the 2024–27 NLTP to be considered for funding, the approved organisation and NZTA (for its own activities) must comply with the NZTA Procurement manual and procurement rules, as well as any relevant standards and guidelines as listed in the Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency standards and guidelines register for land transport
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency standards and guidelines register for land transport
The following work categories apply to the local road and state highway maintenance activity classes:
Note that renewals activities (work categories beginning with 2) should consider the need for a Safe System audit.
Safe System Audit Policy (webpage yet to come)
Road maintenance programmes are continuous programmes of activities required to maintain appropriate levels of service for all modes on the roading, footpath and cycling network. As continuous programmes, they have no start or end date. However, the detail required to establish the appropriate investment levels is developed on a 3-year cycle that aligns with the NLTP cycle. Approval of funding assistance from the National Land Transport Fund (NLTF) normally covers the 3-year period of each NLTP and is made when the NLTP is adopted by the NZTA Board.
Emergency works are an exception, in that expenditure is considered for NLTF approval during the course of the NLTP in response to each event. Funding is approved individually on a project basis, with start and end dates for the immediate response and permanent reinstatement of levels of service as a result of the impact of natural events, for example severe storm events.
We expect approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) to follow our investment principles in developing and delivering their road maintenance programmes.
We expect approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) to link their proposals to long-term planning documents, in particular:
These documents should describe the information and assumptions underlying the network management.
The information approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) provide in Transport Investment Online (TIO) to support maintenance programmes should make reference to the relevant parts of long-term planning documents.
Transport Investment Online(external link)
Approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) will develop forward work programmes and budgets for the road maintenance programme to support greater consistency in the delivery of customer levels of service as set out in the One Network Framework (ONF).
The road maintenance programme should demonstrate:
Activities that seek to enhance the level of service are not part of maintenance programmes in the local road or state highway maintenance activity class and are prioritised as improvements under a different activity class. Approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) seeking additional investment to lift the level of service will need to provide evidence for the investment, following the Business Case Approach, for it to be tested against other investments to ensure it demonstrates value for money.
Business Case Approach guidance
The One Network Framework (ONF) is the national classification system for roads and streets. It helps in establishing transport network function, performance measures, operating gaps and potential interventions for each road and street type. The ONF replaced the One Network Road Classification (ONRC) and has been in place since 2021.
All approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) are required to provide evidence of the customer levels of service they propose to deliver and how these relate to the ONF.
Maintenance programme submissions from approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) may be supported by and take account of a wider set of performance measures than those currently mandated in support of the ONF. For example, an approved organisation may wish to support their submission with their long-term planning measures and any measures mandated by the Department of Internal Affairs in addition to the ONF measures.
For the allocation of maintenance programme funding in the 2024–27 NLTP, we will focus primarily on the assessment of transport network performance as measured against ONF requirements.
Details of road operations, maintenance, renewal and improvements activities must be held by the organisation responsible for the programme.
Consideration should be given to:
Differences in levels of service will have an impact on funding assistance.
For further guidance, refer to requirements of a road maintenance programme.
Requirements of a road maintenance programme (webpage yet to come)
We recommend early engagement with our investment advisors as they are available for support and guidance throughout the business case process. See also Business Case Approach guidance on our website.
Business Case Approach guidance
Early engagement and assessment will:
We:
Road maintenance programmes are prioritised under the NZTA Investment Prioritisation Method for the 2024–27 NLTP (IPM).
Updated draft Investment Prioritisation Method 2024–27
2024-27 NLTP Investment Prioritisation Method (webpage yet to come)
The draft IPM includes the following:
We expect to provide some level of funding to all continuous programmes. On this basis, we assign road maintenance programmes default IPM ratings of HHM, priority ranking 1, as the ‘starting point’ for investment prioritisation. This reflects the importance of such programmes to maintaining the existing levels of service (the base programme). We then assess the investment proposals to determine:
The assessment of investment proposals and the resulting priority ranking will assist us in determining the merits of investing to different levels in the various continuous programmes submitted.
All continuous programmes are developed through the application of continuous improvement practices, and ideally involve regular engagement with and feedback from us on the merits of the supporting AMP. We expect these programmes to achieve at least a high GPS alignment rating. Programmes, or activities within a programme, that do not achieve a high rating will be the subject of additional scrutiny as part of the NLTP decision making and we may have to apply additional conditions of funding to the approved programme investment. Any other risks or issues may also be addressed through conditions attached to the funding decision.
Typically, we will approve funding for a road maintenance programme for all 3 years in an NLTP, as part of the NLTP adoption. However, we may decide to impose terms and conditions on funding for all or part of the approved programme, due to:
The terms and conditions may apply across all 3 years of an NLTP or to particular years. For example we may approve funding the first year of a road maintenance programme in the newly adopted NLTP but set conditions that have to be met before funding is released in the subsequent year.