Waipawa traffic detour and roadworks draws ire of struggling businesses

Road workers carry out water pipe maintenance and two raised crossings were being installed at Waipawa on State Highway 2 in September. Photo: Supplied / Duncan Smith

By Kate Green of RNZ

Business owners in the Central Hawke’s Bay town of Waipawa say more than a month of roadworks unrelated to Cyclone Gabrielle will be the final straw after a tough year.

Traffic is being diverted around the town as water pipe maintenance is carried out and two raised crossings are installed on the main road, State Highway 2.

A notice on the council website said the diversion would be in place until October 15.

In separate statements, the council and Waka Kotahi pointed out residents had been campaigning for these safety improvements for years.

Waipawa Butchery owner Duncan Smith, whose store is on the main street, predicted it would lose more than half its income from a lack of walk-ins as people took the detour around the town.

“We’ll lose a significant amount of money.

“The reality is, if we’ve got 25 or 30 per cent of our income, it’s not even going to cover costs.”

Smith did not understand why Waka Kotahi could not complete the work at night, or begin by lowering the speed limit through the town rather than installing the raised crossings.

Confusion was adding to angst, with messages mixed on how long the work would take. The council website said five weeks, residents said they were told six, and signage on the road shows an end date of 30 October - seven weeks.

Waipawa Butchery owner Duncan Smith.

“Nobody’s got a problem with slowing the traffic down,” he said, but with so much repair work going on around the region post-cyclone, “this is a spend that seems a little misguided”.

“There’s a rebuild going on here,” Sith said.

“You’ve got contractors, you’ve got plumbers, you’ve got builders, you’ve got trucks carting silt, metal, all sorts of things around, and now they’re going to be held up by the traffic by that.”

Traffic builds on Waipawa's State Highway 2 as water pipe maintenance was being carried out and two raised crossings were being installed on 7 September, 2023.

There had been compromise since Monday, however, what began as a full northbound lane closure had been relaxed to stop/go traffic management, but most people were still taking the detour due to the queues.

Another business owner, Bruce Stephenson, whose Stephenson Transport business was on a side street off the main highway, said the stop/go traffic management made it difficult for his 50 trucks to access the main road.

“The speed humps, I believe, are not necessary, and it could be fixed simply by lowering the speed limit, but they don’t seem to even want to trial that.”

He said a lot of the town’s business was from people passing through, and he felt for the businesses on the main strip.

“Two of them are new business owners, and we all need cash flow to exist.”

However, Waka Kotahi said the Waipawa community had been advocating for this work for years.

“Many locals, including some retailers, have expressed concern at the speed by which traffic flows through Waipawa and ‘slow down’ is commonly heard by the community on the main street, as road users drive through,” it said in a statement.

The Transport Agency said a letter drop was carried out to the community, including retailers and local media, on September 1 with details of traffic management - earlier than locals said they were notified.

“We have listened to the business community and adapted our traffic management for the first stage (stormwater work) to a stop-go arrangement that allows traffic to travel both directions and use the car parks outside the shops. This will be in place for about two weeks.

“We will be working on an adjusted traffic management plan for stage 2 (construction of the crossings) and will share these with the community prior to construction start.”

Overnight work for the raised crossings was considered, but not possible as the concrete took daylight hours to set.

Waka Kotahi said safety work did not impact the budget for recovery and rebuild work and used different crews with different skill sets.

Central Hawke’s Bay District Council confirmed the works came off the back of earlier engagement with the community, including a petition in 2020 that attracted more than 1000 signatures, and a community campaign with signage, which remained in place, reminding people to slow down.