Tuesday 22 December

Aerial maps now available online for Whangārei to Port Marsden Highway – share your thoughts

Kia ora,

In late November, we announced an emerging preferred corridor for the SH1 Whangārei to Port Marsden Highway project.

The emerging preferred corridor includes upgrading the current state highway to four lanes (with some sections built on a new alignment to straighten out curves), with a separated walking and cycling path between Whangārei and Port Marsden Highway (SH15).

Since our last update, our project team have been busy meeting with landowners within the emerging preferred corridor to discuss individual property impacts in more detail.

We can now share the emerging preferred corridor in more detail and have published an aerial map online.

It’s important to note the design of the road within the emerging preferred corridor is at a very early stage of development and the line of the highway shown is indicative only. Design detail including the form of intersections, access points and location of the shared path are not yet known.

Some areas of the emerging preferred corridor, such as areas south of Portland Road and north of Oakleigh, are particularly wide as these areas require additional investigations to inform the design of the highway.

The width of the emerging preferred corridor shown will be refined over the coming months through ground investigations, landowner consultation and design work.

Aerial maps now available

We have published individual sections of the corridor map, to make it easier for people to print specific areas of the emerging preferred corridor off the website.

The emerging preferred corridor includes areas of land on either side of the highway, as shown between red lines.

An indicative design of the upgraded highway will be added to the map within the next 6-8 months showing the location of traffic lanes, intersection layouts, access points and the shared path within the red dotted lines. The term we use for the emerging design is the ‘indicative alignment.’

The red lines will be refined as a result of technical investigations, consultation and design work to show the area of land needed to construct, operate and maintain the upgraded highway. As the project progresses through 2021, we will start to refer to the refined corridor as the ‘proposed designation boundary.’

At the end of 2021, or early 2022, we will be seeking approvals under the Resource Management Act (1991). The map we lodge with our resource consent application and Notice of Requirement to designate the land required is titled ‘Indicative Alignment within Proposed Designation Boundary.’

If you are interested in seeing the level of design detail shown on maps at the time of consenting, please take a look are what we prepared earlier this year for our Warkworth to Wellsford project.

Click here to see the Whangarei to Port Marsden Highway aerial maps.

Share your thoughts with us

We want to hear from communities within the Whangārei district, regional road users and visitors to Northland on how they move through this section of SH1 so we can make informed decisions on highway design elements.

We are planning to host community events in February 2021 so you can meet the project team and find out more about the work we’re doingWe welcome your feedback on the emerging preferred corridor and invite you to leave your comments on our interactive mapping tool, Social Pinpoint.

Leave your feedback by dragging a marker and dropping it on the map or join the discussion by responding to other people’s comments.

Click here to visit our Social Pinpoint feedback site.

What happens next?

Ground investigations and survey work will get underway over summer to assist the team in confirming the location of the four-lane highway within the corridor. Environmental assessments will also get underway and the designers will be looking at local road connections and access points along the highway.

At this very early stage in project development we don’t have all the answers but will work to share information with you as the project develops.

More information

For more information on the SH1 Whangārei to Port Marsden Highway project, contact us at W2PMH@nzta.govt.nz

Visit our website www.nzta.govt.nz/w2pmh