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Despite funding boosts, Auckland Transport (AT) says it will take years to catch up on road maintenance, which has been constrained over the past five years.
At a Rural Advisory Panel meeting on September 8, AT’s asset maintenance and renewals portfolio director Alan Wallace gave a frank overview of the state of Auckland’s roads.
“There needs to be a lot more investment – the roads are going backwards,” Wallace said.
After a number of tight budgets, Auckland Transport’s (AT) road renewals has been given a $238 million budget with a $35 million approved over-spend – an increase of 30 per cent on last year.
Wallace said the storm events this year had “caught AT with its pants down” on road maintenance.
“We have got a backlog that is going to take five to 10 years to catch up on.”
He cautioned about believing political parties who said they could fix the problem because it was a matter of funding, time and resources.
Rodney’s unsealed road maintenance also saw a funding boost from $2.4 million to $5.1 million. An additional $3 million was allocated for rehabilitating unsealed roads in Rodney, which is expected to address about 40 kilometres.
Rodney councillor Greg Sayers encouraged the panel to call for an increase in capital expenditure on the unsealed road network.
Panel member Jesse Brennan asked how AT prioritised rural road maintenance.
Wallace said details on road servicing were kept and AT aimed to do resurfacing every 10 years.
AT’s latest budget aims to have 400 kilometres or six per cent of sealed roads resurfaced this year, but Wallace said they should be doing eight per cent.
“Deferring the resealing could cost 10 times as much if you leave it – once it gets rough you will never get it back to what it was without a complete reconstruction,” Wallace said.
Chair Andy Baker said AT was not often the decision-maker over funding.
Baker said Auckland Council’s draft long-term plan would be out at the end of the year and emphasised the importance of funding AT’s capital works in the plan.
