Merton Road Shared Cycleway

GHD is pleased to announce the completion of the Merton Road Shared Cycleway in Auckland.  With innovation and team work at its core, the cycleway project is a success story for GHD, HEB and Auckland City Council. One kilometre in length, the cycleway presented a number of unique and interesting challenges for all parties involved. The preliminary design and consultation began in April 2009.

Considerable stakeholder management was crucial for this project and as part of the review process, included liaison with various groups including Cycling Action Auckland. The co-ordination of three contracts into one (OHUG, Physical Works and Resurfacing) was successfully executed to ensure optimum timeliness and cost saving.  

The OHUG (overhead to underground power cabling) was staged first, with the physical works organised subsequently to occur during the university holiday period.  Programming to complete the road marking after the resurfacing was complete, was well organised and avoided inconvenience to stakeholders.  A number of on-site complications including tree roots, water and gas mains, power and telecommunication cabling were overcome with good consultation and management practices. GHD designed some innovative techniques involving the bridging of problematic tree roots.  These plans were well implemented by HEB.

Reinforced fibre cement that is eight times stronger than conventional concrete was used, resulting in far less excavation and avoiding the need to disturb deeper lying tree roots.

HEB were also innovative in their use of green oxide in concrete and this resulted in less marking and remarking.  The added utilisation of recycled concrete and brick for basecourse material establishes the shared cycleway as environmentally sustainable.

Over $140,000 in cost savings was achieved as a direct consequence of the high level project management provided by GHD and Peter North, Auckland City Council.

GHD’s Daniel Crosswell, Raymond Tan and Randhir Karma worked closely with Auckland City Council personnel to ensure the cycleway met the project brief.  Their co-ordinated and timely management ensured the project was completed to budget and to the December 2009 deadline.

The Merton Road shared cycleway has greatly enhanced the local area by improving both accessibility and visibility.  Before the physical works started, there was no footpath, just an often impassable and saturated undulating grass berm on the south side of the road.  The community now have a dramatically safer pedestrian and cycle facility, reducing reliance on the use of motor vehicles and encouraging healthy and environmentally friendly cycling and walking.