Collaborative effort ensures success

Up to 26,000 vehicles a day use SH1 between Andersons Bay Road and Lookout Point in Dunedin making it one of the busiest state highways in Otago. Particularly at peak times this section of highway was notorious for traffic jams creating headaches for motorists and the NZTA. A plan was put in place to four lane this stretch of highway to ease congestion, improve safety and reduce travel time on Dunedin’s southern arterial route.

“We were awarded stage one of this project which is almost complete - bar the final asphalt surfacing which will be undertaken in January 2013,” said Mark Woodward, Project Manager for Downer NZ.

The Caversham Highway improvements project is one of the largest roading projects in Otago. Mark explains a bit about stage one of the project, “we have finished four months ahead of schedule, to a high standard of workmanship, and are on budget - you can’t ask for any more than that. The success of this project to date can be put down to the collaborative efforts of Opus, NZTA and the sub contractors that have worked with us. This includes CSP and J C Contracting (NZ) Ltd - the road barrier installers - who we contracted to install the safety barrier to finish off the new road.”

The Nu-Guard 31™ Steel post guardrail system is comparable in cost to wooden post systems and is simpler and up to 50% quicker to install using a guardrail installation machine - saving time and money.

A key safety measure on the four laning project was the provision of a central median (in place of a simple pair of yellow lines) to separate the busy traffic flows. “We also installed just over 1km of Armorwire Wire Rope Safety Barrier with 12 x Armorwire Terminal Ends, Thrie-Beam Barrier and 8 x X-350 Terminal Ends. It was a very large job,” adds Jamie.