End of the road for NTA
It’s the end of the road for the Northland Transportation Alliance (NTA), a collaboration of roading teams from Whangārei, Kaipara and Far North district councils, Northland Regional Council and the NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi.
Following a recent review of transport activities, members of the alliance agreed to disband the regional organisation in favour of a new mixed model. That model will give each council greater control over its own roading maintenance and construction projects, but also allow for collaboration when that makes financial and practical sense.
The Local Government Act requires all councils to review how they deliver transport activities every six years.
For the Far North, the new approach will mean that NTA staff will be redeployed back into Far North District Council and will prioritise work on local roads. The team’s goal is to improve the resilience of the Far North roading network, deliver better value for money for ratepayers and to focus on repairing damage caused by severe weather events in 2022-23. To help achieve that, the council will establish a professional panel for consulting and construction services. Another focus will be to improve relationships with the council’s two roading contractors – Fulton Hogan, which operates across the northern part of the district, and Ventia, which has responsibility for the southern half.
The Northland Transportation Alliance was created in 2016 to foster a closer working relationship between Northland councils and NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi. During the past eight years, it faced significant challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic, huge increases in costs due to international conflicts affecting supply chains, and consequent inflation. This was capped off by a series of damaging storms during 2022 and 2023.
Chair of the Regional Land Transport Committee, Joe Carr, said he believed the NTA was the right initiative in 2016. It allowed for a closer working relationship between all four councils with shared services directed by individual councils, and it enhanced links between the public, councils and contractors. However, times had moved on, the world had evolved, and councils now needed to develop better connections with the work taking place within each district.
Far North residents are reminded that the best way to resolve road-related issues quickly is to report these directly to the council through its Request for Service (RFS) system. Raising an RFS ensures that potholes, slips or any road other defects can be investigated quickly, repairs can be scheduled as required and residents who lodge the RFS can be updated on progress.
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