Traffic began moving through the Desert Road section of State Highway 1 on Friday February 14, after a two-month closure for major repairs.

The reopening is an important milestone for the Tīrau to Waiouru Accelerated Maintenance programme, New Zealand’s largest and most ambitious road maintenance project. The highway between Tūrangi and Waiouru (including the Desert Road) closed to traffic on January 13, with the works meeting the anticipated two-month timeframe.

Roger Brady, Regional Manager of Maintenance and Operations for NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA), says a large amount of work has been achieved in a short time.

“In just over eight weeks NZ Transport Agency contractors have rebuilt and repaired 28 lane kilometres of road, which is 12 lane kms more than planned, and completely rebuilt the deck of the Mangatoetoenui Bridge, 23 kilometres south of Rangipō,” Mr Brady says.

This maintenance work forms part of the government’s $2.07 billion investment into road and drainage renewal and maintenance across 2024-27 via the State Highway Pothole Prevention fund.

“By doing the work under full road closures, more invasive construction methods can be used which would not be possible under stop/go traffic management. It means SH1 is being brought up to a higher standard quickly, and New Zealanders can get back on a quality road surface sooner,” Mr Brady says.

In the week before the reopening, the team was laying an average of 500 tonnes asphalt per day.

While SH1 was closed the detour (from north to south) was via SH41, SH47, SH4, SH49 and back to SH1 in Waiouru. This added around 35-40 minutes to journeys.

NZTA advises there will be further works required to finish the final surface on the Desert Road later in the year. This work will, wherever possible, be done at night. The scheduling is still being worked through for when this final surfacing will be done.

Across the wider SH1 project, including the central and southern Waikato, work is now complete on 86.78km lane kms (since September 2024). 

At times there have been 32 contracting firms at work on the project, which has required approximately 162,609 tonnes of aggregate. Combined workforce hours for the road crews is now estimated at 85,000 hours on the project.