At the blessing of the Waipoua River Rd sealing project, from left, Te Roroa Development Group general manager Snow Tane, Kaipara District Council liaison Haki Rudolph, Te Roroa chairman Thomas Hohaia, Northland MP Willow-Jean Prime and Kaipara Mayor Jason Smith, with former Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones in front. Photo / supplied
At the blessing of the Waipoua River Rd sealing project, from left, Te Roroa Development Group general manager Snow Tane, Kaipara District Council liaison Haki Rudolph, Te Roroa chairman Thomas Hohaia, Northland MP Willow-Jean Prime and Kaipara Mayor Jason Smith, with former Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones in front. Photo / supplied
The Kaipara is about to get its first set of traffic lights more than 150 years after they were invented.
The traffic lights will be installed not in downtown Dargaville or even booming Mangawhai but on a scenic stretch of Waipoua River Rd too narrow for two-way traffic.
It's partof a major road upgrade which will eventually pave the way for Rākau Rangatira, a nationally significant project to protect the great kauri of Waipoua Forest and upgrade ageing visitor infrastructure.
The first step, sealing Waipoua River Rd, was blessed last Friday.
It will be paid for by a $1.7 million grant announced in 2019 by what was then the Provincial Growth Fund.
Te Roroa Development Group general manager Snow Tane said the currently unsealed 1.6km stretch of road from State Highway 12 to what used to be the Waipoua Forest visitors' centre needed constant maintenance to fill in potholes and keep it driveable.
The traffic lights would be required for a 50m single-lane section.
With a cliff down to Waipoua River on one side and a rock face topped by kauri trees on the other, there was no way of widening the road without building out over the water.
Te Roroa had operated the campground, cafe and visitors' centre at the road end since it was returned in a Treaty settlement, but the area had become a ''ghost town'' due to the pandemic and track closures aiming to prevent the spread of kauri dieback.
The complex was currently being used as offices instead. It would, however, become a key part of Rākau Rangatira, which would be a ''park and ride'' system similar to that operated at Milford Sound.
Tourists would leave their vehicles at the visitors' centre, then take a shuttle — hopefully electric — to one end of a new track taking in Te Matua Ngahere and Tāne Mahuta, the two biggest kauri in the country.
They would be picked up at the other end and returned to the visitors' centre.
Sealing of Waipoua River Rd is the first step in a major project aiming to better protect Tāne Mahuta and the other kauri of Waipoua Forest. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Funding for the joint Te Roroa-DOC project was approved by the Government some years ago and is also part of the Northland Economic Action Plan. Tane said it was a project of national significance with the sealing of Waipoua River Rd just the first step.
Infrastructure and tracks around Tāne Mahuta were 30 years old and didn't offer enough security against people trying to leave the path, potentially spreading kauri dieback. The rest of the project was still in the design phase, he said.
Shane Jones, Regional Economic Development Minister when the funding was announced, said it was an overdue project in a forgotten area in terms of infrastructure.
''I'm sure it will be a positive development for Waipoua tourism,'' he said.
Traffic lights have long been part of Whangārei's urban landscape. However, the Far North joined the club only in 2017 when traffic lights were installed on Marsden Rd to control a pedestrian crossing between the wharf and Williams Rd.
When cruise ships still frequented the bay the constant stream of pedestrians caused long hold-ups and prompted some drivers to ignore the crossing and put people in danger.
Volunteers armed with stop-go signs used to manage the crossing but a new health and safety law put the kibosh on that.
The world's first traffic lights were installed at Parliament Square in London in 1868. They were gas-powered and manually operated, and exploded a month later.
