The finish line is in sight

Kia ora

You would've seen our crews packing up in and around the village centre over the past month and it’s fantastic to report that our work in Ashhurst is almost complete.

We’d like to thank everyone who worked with us to share their ideas to improve safety around Ashhurst.

We know it’s been challenging to have so much extra traffic travelling through your village. We’re glad to hear many of the changes we've made are making a difference.

We know our work took longer than anticipated. By responding to residents, business and community needs, we designed changes on the go and added a few extra projects in, such as upgrading the Salisbury Street pedestrian crossing and widening Wyndham Street.

What’s coming up?

Our construction crews are installing new directional signs around town and we're making changes around the intersection of State Highway 3 (Napier Road) and Cambridge Avenue.

We've heard concerns about this intersection and our designers are investigating ways to make it safer.

While this work is underway we will be making temporary changes to make the intersection safer. A 50km/h speed restriction will be in place and we’ll use road cones to remove the slip lane and simplify the intersection layout.

Other traffic management and road signs will be in place to help manage how people travel through the site.

Please drive with extra care and attention while you get used to the temporary changes.

We expect these to be in place for a number of weeks while we investigate long-term changes with key stakeholders including Palmerston North City Council, local businesses and people who live nearby.

Once this pre-engagement work is complete, we will update you about our plans and seek feedback before making any long-term changes.

The project team would like to thank you again for your patience and understanding over the past year or so as we’ve worked on the Ashhurst Traffic Mitigation project.

Ngā mihi,

The project team

Project overview

We've made a number of changes to improve safety in Ashhurst. You can check them out on the project map on our website.

Our new village centre

We're pleased to say that the village centre improvements are almost finished.

These improvements include new raised islands, planting, and kerb buildouts to create a slow zone around community facilities, shops and Ashhurst School. We have some great green spaces with shrubs planted and an improved pedestrian crossing.

As part of this work we have also made changes to improve traffic flow. The main difference you will notice as a pedestrian is that getting from one location to another is easier and it will feel safer.

The last thing left to do is install new road signs. We expect this to be completed in July.

More information

For more information on Ashhurst traffic mitigation, contact us at ashhurst@nzta.govt.nz or visit our website www.nzta.govt.nz/ashhurst

You can also call our community engagement advisor Natalie Dixon on 0279778866.