Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency advises motorists driving on State Highway 1 through the Dome Valley that it has completed widening of the northbound side of the road north of Kaipara Flats Road and is now switching work on to the southbound side.
The completed section of road is north of Warkworth, from 200m north of Christine Place to Grimmer's Bridge to the south (near the Red Shed).
The work is part of planned safety improvements on SH1 through the Dome Valley. It includes widening the centre line and road side shoulders, adding right hand turn bays and installing flexible road safety barriers.
The Transport Agency’s Senior Manager Project Delivery, Andrew Thackwray, says there will be three nights of stop/go traffic control, starting on Sunday 15 March, to switch traffic on to the new section of road. This will then allow work to start on the southbound side of SH1.
The stop/go traffic control will operate between Christine Place and Grimmer's Bridge, between 7pm and 5am each night.
The road will be reduced to one lane so that crews can shift traffic lanes and apply lane markings on the highway on Sunday night, before relocating the temporary steel barriers on Monday and Tuesday nights. The work is weather dependent.
There will also be stop/go traffic control on Sunday night between 7pm and 5am on a 400m section of SH1 south of Wayby Valley Road, near the Hoteo River Bridge. Crews will be removing trees along the roadside in this area.
“During the work, our team will use temporarily stop/go traffic controls to ensure the safety of the work crews and road users. We will be monitoring the queues and minimising wait times as much as possible,” says Mr Thackwray.
“The Transport Agency apologises for any inconvenience and advises road users to plan ahead and allow extra time for their journeys. The work is being done at night to minimise disruption for freight movements and the travelling public.”
Meanwhile, further north in the middle of the Dome Valley, the project team is working with Vector to install 15km of high voltage cable ducts under the highway to future proof the power supply north of Auckland.
The ducts are being laid in trenches along the northbound shoulder at night. To provide a safe work area, stop/go traffic management is in place from 7pm to 6am, Sunday to Thursday nights, over a rolling 300m section of SH1 north of “Frog Pool Farm.”
These night works will continue for another seven weeks before safety improvements begin.
The project started in early-2019 and is expected to be completed in late-2021. The work is split into stages along the 15km section of SH1 from Wellsford to north of Warkworth. Two stages are currently under construction and the stage south of Sheepworld is due to be completed in August this year.
The project is being delivered as part of the Safe Network Programme, a collaborative, prioritised programme of proven safety interventions on high risk routes across New Zealand.
More info at www.nzta.govt.nz/projects/sh1-dome-valley
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