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Napier Road/Crosses Road roundabout construction

In April 2022, Hastings District Council began construction of a new roundabout at the intersection of Napier Road and Crosses Road to reduce congestion and improve travel time and road safety. The physical construction works will take approximately 5 months to complete.

Work began on the construction of the roundabout at the intersection of Napier Road and Crosses Road on Monday, April 11 2022. The roundabout - which will reduce congestion and improve travel time and safety - will take approximately five months to complete. Final asphalting of the new roundabout was completed on Friday 28 October.

DSC00115

Key Points

  • During the construction works, there will be some disruption but the contractor will work closely with businesses and residents to minimise this.
  • Road users will experience some delays during the works including lane closures and detours at times but these will be kept to a minimum.
  • The only occasion there might be a complete road closure required will be when asphalt sealing and water and pipe works have to be undertaken, however, this will be undertaken during non-peak times.
  • Some night work may be undertaken to enable the contractor to complete their works within the specified timeframes.
  • Coffee at Crosses Café on the corner of Napier Road and Crosses Road will retain all of its parking spaces, however, the works will involve building a retaining wall separating the café parking from the pavement.

The below update covers questions and queries raised by residents and other stakeholders during and after the public meeting on the topic of the proposed Napier Road - Crosses Road roundabout. The meeting was held on-site on the corner of Napier Road and Crosses Road on 2 December 2021.

Questions & Answers
Note: The following questions are listed in no particular order of importance.

1. Are we installing a safety barrier between the footpath and the road on Crosses Road? This is not a requirement at the moment. It will be a standard footpath behind the kerb and channel.

2. Will there be dust protection during construction to protect the business and residents from getting too sandy and dusty? Yes. Dust suppression during construction is a standard requirement in all our contracts. This will be carefully monitored during construction.

3. Will there be more noise because the road will be shifted closer to the businesses? We will get more cars passing so this might increase noise levels? The planned growth and development in close proximity of the current intersection, and subsequent increase in traffic numbers is a contributing factor for a roundabout as an intersection control. The introduction of a roundabout would result in a lower speed environment which might reduce noise associated with speeding cars. Driver behaviour however plays a big role in the overall noise factor. The roundabout surface will be constructed using AC as a structural component, but it may be supplementary to tire noise reduction.

4. Can we change the design to save the trees on Crosses Road? Our designers have done a high-level design in which we position the roundabout in such a way that it doesn’t impact the vegetation on Crossed Road and still comply with required design standards in accordance with the specified design vehicles. In order to achieve this outcome, Council would have to buy significant portions of land, which would make this project unfeasible. Council will further investigate the viability to relocate the impacted vegetation to suitable locations e.g. along the Karamu stream during the construction stage. 

Roundabout design for MailChimp

5. Is it possible to change the pedestrian crossings to be zebra crossings? The crossing would be better between the Dairy and St. Hill Lane – tending closer to St. Hill Lane. That will cater to the child education centre, the dairy and those residents on both sides of Napier Road who wish to cross what is now a very busy (increasingly so) road. The further the crossing is from the roundabout, the less likely people are to use it. This will lead to pedestrians crossing over the berm anywhere they want and this is much more dangerous. The placing of a zebra crossing in Napier Road to serve the dairy and child education centre is outside the scope of the roundabout but it can be investigated and evaluated separately from the roundabout construction. Such an investigation would be scheduled after the completion of the roundabout construction, once pedestrian movements have returned back to normal, most likely in the next financial year.

6. Can we make a right-turn into Raven Grove, where the turn is right now? Otherwise, visitors need to make a U-turn further down Napier Rd and with that, it will be harder for residents, businesses, and their customers to access Raven Grove.  A right-turn bay from the South-bound lane of Napier Road into Raven Grove will be taken into account in the final design to accommodate this request. Raven Grove will retain a left out only with an island to direct traffic left. This design change will have to be reviewed in a Road Safety Audit before it can be confirmed to be incorporated.

7. In the interest of all residents in the area the lighting should be directed down to the road and deflected from residential properties - not light up all of the houses. The lighting in this area is already at a great height – no attempt at deflecting it away from residential homes has ever been made. It was acknowledged that there will be additional lighting with the roundabout.  Due to the importance of the intersection, it will be brighter than the current lighting levels on Napier Road. We are using 12m high LED lighting with a 3-meter outreach. The light will be bright right under the poles and then gradually become less bright around it. Deflectors may be considered to contain excessive light spill into properties if required.

8. The on-the-road parking on Napier Road (just off the roundabout where the residents are) – is that necessary; can we make that only for residents, can we make it so a minimum number of cars have to go through that section? The reason we have assigned road parking spaces at that location is that we are removing the current road parking in that area. Signage will indicate that this road is not the main route so it is expected most people will use the main route through the roundabout and avoid going into this area unless they need to specifically be there.

9. Can we make the cycleway go “through” the retaining wall at the end of the café parking straight onto the cycleway/footpath on Crosses Rd? Yes, the design will be amended accordingly.

10. What is the consultation procedure in terms of legislation that the council must comply with? In the Hastings District Plan (Partially Operative with the Exception of Section 16.1 & Appendix 50) in Chapter 22.1 (network utilities) Rule NU4 confirms the work is a permitted activity. 

Napier Road Roundabout table

 In the same plan Appendix 66: Designations it is confirmed the Designating Authority is the Hastings District Council.


As the work is a permitted activity there is no legislated public consultation required.
 
11. Positioning of the roundabout. The roundabout position has been progressed from the 2006 concept roundabout design (reflected below) even before the business and residential development were affected.
 

Roundabout design 2006

12. It was not made clear where the level of the road will start to be raised approaching the roundabout from a southerly direction. It was indicated that would be “about” the area of Raven Grove. This will have privacy issues for some residents. You indicated that we would need to seek consent to build a higher fence to mitigate any problems – with noise as well as privacy. It is only the area where the proposed roundabout will be constructed that needs to be raised a small amount to ensure there is sufficient drainage, hence the ~800mm max height retaining wall at the café boundary. At the entrance of Raven Grove (where the current boundary between the grass and the parking lot for the café is), there will be no notable change of level.
 
13. No details relating to traffic flow (present or expected), recorded accidents, congestion or other traffic issues were given. The website states that it is required “to reduce congestion, improve travel time and road safety. WSP has done a traffic analysis in February 2021. According to the traffic count, the worst-performing movement is the right turn from Crosses Rd onto Napier Rd during the AM peak, where drivers are delayed on average by 70 seconds. The analysis demonstrates that the proposed roundabout would have adequate capacity to accommodate the anticipated vehicle volumes in 2030 (based on a 5% growth rate from the 2021 survey). The performance of the roundabout vastly improves capacity while reducing the average delay of vehicles along Crosses Road from 70 seconds to less than 10 seconds in 2021 according to the model.

FURTHER UPDATES
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