Red-chip look quietly stopped

Council staff were unhappy with the colour clash along Auckland Rd in St Heliers Bay. Picture / Richard Robinson

After 101 years of paving the streets of Auckland City with red chip, council officials have quietly dropped the iconic colour scheme.

The council stopped using red-chip concrete in March. Residents were not told, nor councillors, and it came as a huge surprise to the company that provides the paving material.

The distinctive red chip has been a feature of Auckland's streets since 1904. It is also known as McCullum's red chip, after the company that mines the sedimentary rock.

Two years ago, red-chip concrete was voted tops by the public after the council laid nine material samples - ranging from plain, oxide and black pebble concrete to asphalt - on an empty section in Sandringham.

The council started laying the red-chip concrete with gusto, mostly in heritage areas, as part of a $10 million-a-year renewal programme. Kepa Rd and Holgate Rd in the eastern bays and Grey Lynn's Crummer Rd are among streets given the treatment.

Part-way into the programme, officers noticed a patchwork effect in areas where large numbers of new concrete and asphalt driveways had been laid, and decided the colour clash was too much.

One such street is Auckland Rd in St Heliers, where resident Arthur Gillman said the different driveway surfaces did not bother him. The new red-chip footpath was a vast improvement.

Officers drafted a paper intended for the council's transport committee in July to change the footpath policy for "no red-chip, exposed-concrete footpaths on the roading network", except where red-chip concrete had been laid in part of a street.

Only black-chip concrete was to be used for footpaths and driveways, said the paper, obtained by the Herald.

"From a policy perspective, the proposed changes will result in a consistently higher-quality look and feel across the isthmus," wrote a traffic and roading manager, Neill Forgie. He and three senior officers signed the report, which never saw the light of day.

McCullum Bros, which bought equipment and hired staff to provide between 600cu m and 800cu m of red-chip concrete a month, was furious at being cut out of the market.

As a supplier of materials, it does not have a contract with the council; the contract is between the council and the company laying the footpaths, John Filmore Ltd.

"We are very disappointed that the public and ourselves have had no notification of this policy change," McCullum Bros managing director John McCullum wrote to former chief executive Bryan Taylor.

The first time politicians were alerted to the change was at an environment, heritage and urban form committee meeting in July. The supplier of brown oxide that goes into the red-chip concrete, Santa Maharaj, blew the whistle on the "arrogant" behaviour of council staff. The matter was passed to the transport committee.

Traffic and roading services group manager Joseph Flanagan said the council stopped using red-chip concrete in March, but he stressed that officers were still working on the issue and "no decision" had been made. The council was continuing to upgrade 664km of poor footpaths in areas that did not qualify for red-chip concrete.

Mr Flanagan said officers withdrew the July report when they realised it was an "amenity" issue, not a transport issue, and decided to rework it for the arts, recreation and community committee meeting in December.

"I expect the recommendations will encourage the use of red chip in selected areas, with guidelines around introducing new vehicle crossings," Mr Flanagan said.