Yesterday I was able to witness first hand some of the hard work that has been happening across the district to recover from Cyclone Gabrielle.

It’s a relief to see river levels dropping with the steady fine weather. There is still some flooding in areas around the Northern Wairoa, which we are still monitoring. We expect these to return to normal by Tuesday.

UPDATED: 2.17PM Thursday 02 March 2023

When you see the sun come out and the wind has dropped, it could be difficult to believe what we have experienced in the last few days.

On the final stretch of 2022, the team have been pushing hard to complete outstanding work before the end of the year. Work continues on both the unsealed and sealed networks in anticipation of the summer rush and the expected increase in traffic. 

With the continued improvements in weather, we are now full swing into unsealed and sealed pavement works. We have approximately 50kms of road to reseal in the 2022/23 season.

Our roading team made the most of the warmer, drier weather that came our way in September.

August brought a welcome reprieve from the wild weather and storm events of July. A total of 3,100 individual work items were completed throughout August.

Wild, wet and windy weather kept crews busy in July. A total of 3,358 individual work items were completed throughout the month. 

In May, we saw some great progress happening across the district. Sealed pavement rehabs are now complete, and the unsealed network has received the last of the PGF/IRG funding. 

April’s relatively calm weather meant that Kaipara’s roading team could focus on jobs carrying over from previous months, and complete work on this year’s sealed pavement rehabs, unsealed heavy metal sites, and footpath kerb and channel renewals before the wet winter weather sets in.

There was a real sense of Groundhog Day in March, following on from Cyclone Dovi in February when the district was hit with a significant rain event. For Kaipara’s roading team, it was all hands-on deck with the clean-up.