Entry received from: Kaipara District Council
Category: Collaborative Government Action
Following several years of underinvestment in Kaipara District Council's road network, the unsealed network was recognised as being in a poor state. Kaipara District Council (KDC) chose to initiate three major projects under the Provincial Growth Fund (PGF), one of which was the Kaipara District Road Improvements, with unsealed road improvements being one component of the roading improvement application, and so the Center of Excellence (CoE) for Unsealed Roads was created.
This CoE was developed to manage the whole investment process including the planning and physical works delivery process improvements, that would lead to a better-quality network. It was envisaged that this would be a repeatable and transferable process that could be utilised by other the councils in Northland, under the direction of the Northland Transportation Alliance (NTA), and the rest of New Zealand in time. The focus of the CoE project was developing a standard model for evaluating and implementing the network/s maintenance, improvements and specifications used in the delivery of the physical works while working collaboratively with the contractors to support lifting staff knowledge, competencies, and skills.
Although Kaipara was the kick start of this project there was collaboration from key stakeholders to ensure the work is now considered business as usual across Northland and beginning to promote it as best practice to the Nation. The CoE has improved road safety and resilience and reduced the cost of unsealed road management by approximately $1,500/kilometre per annum.
Thank you to our category sponsor