SH1 Cambridge to Piarere

Project update

9 May 2025

Te Manu Rangimaarie being installed at Piarere

Bird of peace soaring in Piarere

A striking 12-metre-high sculpture now watches over travellers at the intersection of State Highways 1 and 29 in Piarere.

Te Manu Rangimaarie (bird of peace), a mythical manu (bird) weighing around 12.5 tonne, was installed in the centre of the new roundabout in March.

Designed by world-renowned Waikato artist Fred Graham, Te Manu Rangimaarie celebrates a powerful story of heritage, unity, and peace and reflects the deep connection between ngaa hapuu o Waikato (the sub-tribes of Waikato), the land, and the many waterways that run through the region.

The artwork is a tribute to Wiremu Tamihana Tarapiipipi Te Waharoa of Ngaati Haua, a key figure in the establishment of the Kīngitanga movement. Guided by the principles of faith (te whakapono), lore (te ture), and love (te aroha), he dedicated his life to seeking justice and peaceful solutions.

Positioned to face Taupiri maunga (mountain), Te Manu Rangimaarie also acknowledges an ancient shift in the Waikato River’s course - when it turned from the Hauraki Gulf to Taupiri before flowing west to the sea.

Made of weathered steel, the sculpture was built by Frankton-based metal fabrication firm Longveld, which worked with mana whenua on several of the large sculptures on the Waikato Expressway, including the Cambridge section and on Hamilton’s Resolution Interchange.

Read the Waikato Times article about Te Manu Rangimaarie.

Finishing works continue on the new roundabout, including lighting and landscaping, with all work expected to be completed by mid-2025.

A 'birds' eye view of Te Manu Rangimaarie at the SH1/SH29 roundabout.

The C2P project team has been out and about

The SH1 Cambridge to Piarere expressway (C2P) project team is busy working through a critical part of building a road – detailed design. This is where we confirm the final layout of the road, and what we need to do to build it, as well as how we’ll deal with stormwater, what the landscaping elements need to look like, where all the service cables are and where they might need to shift to. 

While most of the hard work is done in an office, to get a real flavour of what’s involved we need to get out on site. 

Early in April, members of the project team from NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA) and WSP visited sites along the route. This included experts on stormwater management, geology, ecology, landscaping, services (like power, internet and phone lines), project management and communications. 

NZTA Senior Project Manager, Manish Basavaraj said there’s nothing better than standing on site to get a real understanding of the size of the project. 

“It can be hard to grasp what’s involved in building a road a big as the Cambridge to Piarere expressway, and it’s not until you’re standing on site that you can appreciate the scale of the task at hand,” says Manish. 

“On top of that, site visits can help us confirm the information we get from our computer modelling and satellite imagery and help us better understand what the construction impacts on the community could be.”

If you’re driving around SH1 over the next few months, don’t be surprised to see people in hi-viz on the side of the road huddled around a map and pointing into the distance.

The C2P project team getting a feel for the project.

The C2P project team have been out and around the Karāpiro area.

Upcoming geotech investigations on SH1 from 11 May

A key part of the detailed design work is geotechnical investigations. This work allows us to better understand what’s below the surface to help us design and plan how to build the road. 

It involves robust testing of the soil and rock at various sites across the construction area, that looks at ground conditions, including soil and rock types, groundwater depths, strength of soil and rock, and gathering soil and rock samples to assess.

These geotechnical investigations have been progressing for several months across different properties in Karāpiro, and we’re now at a stage where we need to look underneath the existing road on SH1. 

This work involves digging a 0.4m by 0.4m pit in the road and using our specialist equipment to investigate what is underneath and collect soil samples. Once one site is completed, the crew will patch up the road before moving to the next site. 

Work is expected to start during the week starting Sunday 11 May for 6 nights between 9pm and 6am, finishing by Saturday 17 May, weather dependent.

As this work is being done in the middle of SH1 there will be temporary traffic management in place, which will cause a minor delay.

Here are the areas that we'll be working on:

State Highway 1

• 5 sites between 333 and 425 Tīrau Road
• 12 sites between 504 and 608 Tīrau Road
• 2 sites between 946 and 977 Tīrau Road

Karāpiro Road 

• 4 sites between 21 and 70 Karāpiro Road

Hickey Road 

• 1 site between SH1 and 24 Hickey Road

A rig boring for soil samples in Karāpiro. This is the sort of investigations we'll be doing on SH1 from 12 May.

Resurfacing work on Cambridge Expressway

Road users are advised to plan ahead for traffic delays for resurfacing works on the Cambridge section of SH1 Waikato Expressway starting on Monday 12 May, through to the end of July 2025.

Crews will be asphalt resurfacing, which involves removing the layer of the road and replacing it with a new asphalt surface.

The work over the next 2 weeks from Monday to Friday includes:

Southbound left-hand lane (slow lane) between Thornton Road and the Tīrau interchange, starting 6am Monday 12 May and finishing 8pm Tuesday 13 May (Monday night inclusive).

Northbound left-hand lane (slow lane) between Tīrau interchange and Thornton Road, starting 6am Monday 19 May and finishing 6pm Friday 23 May. Work will be carried out during these times:

• Monday 19 May 6am to 6pm Tuesday 20 May
• Wednesday 21 May 6am to 6pm Thursday 22 May  
• Friday 23 May 6am to 6pm

Northbound left-hand land between Thornton Road and Victoria Road interchange, starting Monday 26 May and finishing Thursday 29 May, between 6am and 6pm. 

During this work, the right-hand lane will remain open, under a temporary speed limit of 50km/h.

Further updates on the next section of works will be shared before the end of May.

You can find more information about this work on the NZTA website.

Supporting Road Safety Week 2025

Road Safety Week 2025 is coming up on 12 – 18 May and we encourage you to join us in getting involved.

Coordinated annually by road safety charity Brake and sponsored by NZTA and Beca, Road Safety Week aims to raise awareness and promote steps everyone can take to improve road safety in New Zealand.

The theme is ‘Be a road safety hero’. This recognises everyone helping make our roads safer - from people designing and building safer roads to our primary school students on road patrols - and highlights the part we can all play, including by being safe road users.

It’s easy for people, schools, businesses and community organisations to get involved. Register today for a free action pack with guidance and resources to help you.

And here are some great fundraising ideas. 

Tīrau to Waiouru maintenance work has wrapped - for this season

For those who have ventured south past Piarere, you’ll be as thrilled as we are that there are no more road closures on SH1 as part of the SH1 Tīrau to Waiouru Accelerated Maintenance Programme (T2W) for this season. Thank you for putting up with us! 

Road maintenance is a messy but vital business made even more challenging when you have to close sections of New Zealand’s main arterial route, SH1. The amount of work and intensity of work on this project could not have been done under traditional stop/go traffic management within this time period. Using road closures, we’ve delivered works at a much faster pace, working across the full width of the road allowing the mass movement of roading material and increased work teams. This includes up to 145 truckloads of roading metal being delivered to the various sites daily. 

The T2W team want to say a huge thank you to all the communities, businesses, freight, local councils, iwi and road users impacted by our works on SH1 this season. We have spent hundreds of hours considering and managing the detours we’ve sent you on, and even more hours working out how to minimise the disruption as best we can.

We are looking forward to the break before we are back next season. Because, yes, we are coming back next season to do the final surfacing in the areas we worked on and maintenance and rebuilding between Taupō and Tūrangi and in the Tīrau and Tokoroa townships.

Adding the final surface always comes up to 12 months after the initial chipseal surface is laid to ensure it has bedded in properly.

We’re still working on the programme for next season and will be coming to speak to freight, businesses and all our communities when we have the programme.

Keep across the latest information by signing up to the T2W newsletter, which can be found at nzta.govt.nz/t2w.

The T2W crew at the start of the Tīrau to Putāruru section in early September 2024.

More information

For more information on the SH1 Cambridge to Piarere, contact us at c2p@nzta.govt.nz

Visit our website nzta.govt.nz/c2p