Eight week road closure for bridge renewals at Makarau

Drivers and residents along West Coast Road can expect delays and inconvenience for up to two months while Auckland Transport (AT) closes a 7km section of the road for long-awaited repairs to two wooden bridges at Makarau.

The work is due to start this Wednesday, June 12, and all traffic will be diverted via Komokoriki Hill Road, an unsealed loop road that is steep and winding for part of its length.

Contractors will start by removing and replacing the single-track wooden bridge known as Stoney Creek Bridge No 3, just north of 901 West Coast Road, followed next month by Glennies Bridge, just north of Parker Road.

AT said each bridge would take around four weeks to fix, depending on the weather, and signs would be set up on surrounding roads to warn motorists and direct traffic.

A spokesperson urged drivers and local residents to plan ahead and consider using other routes.

“The detour will close the road between either end of Komokoriki Hill Road and traffic will detour through Komokoriki Hill Road,” they said.

“Residents within the road closure will maintain access to their properties, but will not have access across the bridge under repair.”

Drivers have been calling for the bridges to be properly repaired for more than a year, as the bitumen surfaces are worn, uneven and full of holes, bare planks and exposed screws (MM, Mar 4). The project has been in the pipeline since the end of last year, but details of the repairs and need for a detour only emerged last week.

Some local residents expressed concern that Komokoriki Hill Road was being used as the detour route.

The metalled road was used as part of the route for Rally NZ in 2022 and was closed for several weeks last summer and autumn as a result of massive slips caused by heavy rain.

Sandi Webb, who runs her Funky Glass art mosaic business from the northern end of Komokoriki, said having weeks of two-way traffic using the road was a worry.

“It’s okay now, because we haven’t had any real rain yet, but it’s still pretty rough and very, very windy,” she said. “This will be right through the middle of winter.”

She added that when the slips were being repaired last year, large trucks would “come flying down the hill”, with little regard for other traffic.

“I’m very concerned about it.”

Rodney Local Board member Geoff Upson is one of those who have long been campaigning for the bridges to be fixed. He said while he thought Komokoriki Hill Road would be “okay” as a detour route, there could be issues on narrow sections if drivers didn’t obey road rules or just use common sense.

“There are lots of narrow, twisty corners that are definitely not wide enough for oncoming traffic to pass, should they meet on one of the narrow corners,” he said.

The bridge renewal work is being carried out by Auckland-based infrastructure company John Fillmore Contracting.

Anyone with any queries or concerns about the project should contact AT: Email projects@at.govt.nz or call 09 930 5090