Double rubble

Driveways being torn up is a nusiance that shouldn't occur again just months later. Balmoral residents ask, why them? Kieran Nash tries to find the answer.
Having your driveway replaced can be a hassle. But when it happens twice in less than three years, the experience can be downright unpleasant. For the residents of Mt Pleasant Rd, the doubling up of roadworks on their street reeks of money and time wasted.
Two and a half years ago, the Balmoral street's footpaths and driveway entrances were ripped out and replaced. Now Auckland City Council is again digging up the street - and driveway entrances - for drainage work to stop the road from sinking.
Jodie Duncan lives on the street and thinks pouring concrete driveways twice is an unnecessary bother and a waste of money.
"The thing that concerns me is the double work that's being done. The fact that the driveways have been done once - it's the cost of it that irks me."
The current $143,000 job includes $13,000 to repair the driveways. The previous job to replace the footpaths cost $123,000.
Along with costing money, Mrs Duncan says digging up the driveways is a hassle and causes parking problems. "Our driveway was dug up for more than a week with nothing happening to it.
"The other side of the street doesn't have off-street parking so they have to park on our side. We can't see what's coming," Mrs Duncan says.
Next-door neighbour Bob Demler feels the same way.
"It's an inconvenience and it's a mess. It's a reflection  that the left hand and the right hand in the council are not talking to each other," Mr Demler says.
Mrs Duncan agrees. "The only people that are winning are the contractors. Mr Fulton Hogan must be sitting there rubbing his hands together."
She would like to know why the council can't streamline its projects to save time and money.
Council transport manager Tim Lott says he realises the situation is frustrating for some residents.
"I can understand that," he says. The council usually assesses the condition of the road during works and decides whether the entire area needs replacing. Sometimes it's  noticed only later the surface has deteriorated. "If the road condition indicates that it was poor, then we would do that," Mr Lott says. "But it does happen occasionally we do the inspection of the road condition at the time, and at subsequent inspections we pick these things up and see a problem."
This is what happened in this case, he says. "At the time that footpath was being installed there weren't any issues identified.
"We do inspections every year but don't get to every asset every year. This was picked up one year ago.
"What we're trying to do is to protect the life of the assets at the least cost to ratepayers by using smart intervention."
He says the cost of cutting and re-pouring the driveways is not great compared with the $20-25 million spent on footpaths every year.
"We're talking 35 properties at a couple of hundred dollars each. I don't think it's that much of a cost.
"These situations don't occur that often. Occasionally we get these situations when assets are in different cycles and we undertake inspections."
Mr Demler says under the new single Auckland council, communication breakdown is more likely. "The roads are going to be under the control of council organisations who aren't answerable to anyone."
Mrs Duncan says - in jest - the council will probably be back in six months to resurface the road.
She's wrong. It won't be six months - work will start on re-surfacing the road immediately after the drainage work is completed on February 19.