My Account
Waka Kotahi/NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) last month submitted a proposal to the Minister of Transport on the potential tolling of the Puhoi to Warkworth motorway.
An NZTA spokesperson said the proposal provides all the information that Minister Michael Wood will need to make an informed decision on tolling, but does not advocate a position on tolling from NZTA itself.
This is despite the fact that an NZTA tolling team assessment last year found the motorway was suitable for tolling and advocated that the NZTA board recommend to the Minister that the road be tolled.
Meanwhile, NZTA has responded to Local Matters’ enquiries about why the Puhoi to Warkworth motorway is being considered for tolling when other recent major road projects in New Zealand escaped a toll.
NZTA’s tolling team found that tolling the Puhoi to Warkworth motorway would make a meaningful contribution to the cost of the project and would not result in traffic volume changes that would unduly impact the wider road network.
But Mahurangi-based Labour-list MP Marja Lubeck wrote to Minister Wood late last month re-iterating her own, and the Mahurangi community’s, opposition to tolling.
Ms Lubeck said Mahurangi residents would be faced with paying a toll for the Warkworth-Puhoi section of road and then be tolled again as they exit through the Johnstones Hill Tunnels to travel to the Auckland CBD.
“The community sees this as inherently unfair given there are only three toll roads in New Zealand across all of the motorway network, and this would be the only place where two tolls would be in place across what is essentially one road,” she wrote.
Ms Lubeck added that on top of this residents were also saddled with a 10c/litre Auckland Transport levy and a $150 per property transport targeted rate.
Ms Lubeck wrote that in her view the toll proposal “put an unreasonable heavy burden” on the people of Rodney.
However, should the Minister decide in favour of tolling, he will then put the question to Cabinet to make a final decision.
