Local road and state highway maintenance

This page relates to the 2024-27 National Land Transport Programme.

This webpage is under review

An update to reflect the Government Policy Statement on land transport (GPS) 2024 is under way. 

Introduction

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 local road maintenance activity class applies to approved organisations only.
• The state highway maintenance activity class applies to NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA; for its own activities) only.

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:

• Operate – investment in the operation of existing state highways and local roads to deliver an appropriate level of service.
• Maintain – investment in the maintenance of existing state highways and local roads to deliver an appropriate level of service, excluding asset upgrades.
• Renew – investment in renewal of existing state highways and local roads to deliver an appropriate level of service.
• Emergency – urgent response to transport network disruptions to restore an appropriate level of service.

Government expectations

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)

Qualifying for National Land Transport Programme consideration

For us to consider a road maintenance activity for inclusion in the 2024–27 National Land Transport Programme (NLTP), this activity must:

• be public – that is, be defined as any road that is available to the public on a full-time basis
• be included in a regional land transport plan (RLTP)
• meet the definition of road maintenance activities in the GPS 2024
• fit into an appropriate work category in this knowledge base.

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

Procurement manual

Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency standards and guidelines register for land transport

Road maintenance work categories

The following work categories apply to the local road and state highway maintenance activity classes:

• operate
  • work category 121: environmental maintenance
  • work category 122: network services maintenance
  • work category 123: network operations
  • work category 131: level crossing warning devices
  • work category 151: network and asset management
• maintain
  • work category 111: sealed pavement maintenance
  • work category 112: unsealed pavement maintenance
  • work category 113: routine drainage maintenance
  • work category 114: structures maintenance
  • work category 124: cycle path maintenance
  • work category 125: footpath maintenance
  • work category 161: property management – state highways
  • work category 171: financial grants.
• renew
  • work category 211: unsealed road metalling
  • work category 212: sealed road resurfacing
  • work category 213: drainage renewals
  • work category 214: sealed road pavement rehabilitation
  • work category 215: structures component replacement
  • work category 216: bridge and structures renewals
  • work category 221: environmental renewals
  • work category 222: traffic services renewals
  • work category 224: cycle path renewal
  • work category 225: footpath renewal
• emergency
  • work category 140: minor events
  • work category 141: emergency works.

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)

Developing road maintenance programmes

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.

Investment principles

Links to planning

We expect approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities) to link their proposals to long-term planning documents, in particular:

• activity management plans (AMPs)
• council long-term plans (LTPs)
• regional land transport plans (RLTPs).

These documents should describe the information and assumptions underlying the network management.

Information required

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).

One Network Framework 

The road maintenance programme should demonstrate:

• how the proposed road operations, maintenance and renewal activities fit within the maintenance programme
• where necessary, the links to and coordination with delivery of proposed improvement activities (under the improvements activity classes)
• how it optimises the whole-of-life costs of delivering the customer levels of service for the road networks.

Enhanced level of service

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

Customer levels of service

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. 

One Network Framework

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.

Performance measures to support programme submission

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.

Requirements of road maintenance programmes

Details of road operations, maintenance, renewal and improvements activities must be held by the organisation responsible for the programme.

Consideration should be given to:

• the relationship between recommendations in the approved organisation’s and NZTA (for its own activities) AMPs
• changes from national and regional levels of service targets relating to road user satisfaction, safety and asset preservation
• quality assurance
• innovation.

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)

Business case assessment and funding decisions

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:

• enable all involved parties to negotiate the base programme
• allow us to give a view on the merits of an enhanced programme before the approved organisation or NZTA (for its own activities) submits the initial draft request
• in the period between submission of the initial and the final programme proposals, enable the approved organisation and NZTA (for its own activities) to respond to the base and enhanced programme discussions and to provide more information, an amended programme or a combination of both.

We:

• understand that the content and timing for the development of a maintenance programme submission under the relevant NLTP must take account of the other statutory obligations and business processes of approved organisations and NZTA (for its own activities), including the timing for renewing service delivery contracts
• also use the assessment of an organisation’s AMP, organisational capability for activity management and procurement to inform our decisions for the NLTP
• intend to provide feedback to each organisation before the organisation lodges its final programme request.

Prioritising road maintenance programmes

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:

• Activities prioritised as continuous programmes include the local road maintenance programme (operations, maintenance and renewal activities) and the state highways maintenance programme (operations, maintenance and renewal activities).
• The IPM determines a priority ranking for investment in a continuous programme for each activity class based on priority ratings of 3 factors:
  • the GPS alignment rating: this indicates the alignment of the programme with addressing GPS strategic priorities
  • scheduling: indicates whether the activities in the programme should be included in the 2024–27 period
  • efficiency: indicates the expected contribution of the programme relative to costs – for road maintenance programmes this is based on assessment of the relative cost-effectiveness of the programme and its elements through peer group and sector benchmarking comparisons.

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:

• how well the proposed programme identifies and prioritises gaps that align with and contribute to GPS strategic priorities, as well as our other statutory obligations – programmes, or activities in a programme, found to not align well with GPS strategic priorities could see a reduction in the GPS alignment rating;
• the quality of the decision-making framework within the AMP on how they optimise the programme and activities – poor optimisation could see a reduction in the scheduling rating
• the approved organisation’s or NZTA (for its own activities) performance over the previous NLTP
• efficiency based on benchmarking across approved organisations in terms of the cost to deliver the outcome – that is, if the proposed programme is more expensive per unit of outcome, then a lower efficiency rating may be assigned; if more cost effective, then a higher efficiency rating may be assigned recognising every dollar spent should deliver more outcome.

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.

Conditions of funding

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:

• insufficient information submitted to provide us with the confidence to approve funding in full
• a lack of confidence in the forecasts provided in support of the application for funding, or
• network performance indicators providing evidence of low returns on investment with insufficient or unreliable evidence that returns will improve.

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.