Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown says $145m road cone spend is ‘unjustifiable’

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Road cones and construction workers pictured on Manukau Rd. (File photo)

Ruwade Bryant/Stuff

Road cones and construction workers pictured on Manukau Rd. (File photo)

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown has said spending $145 million on road cones and traffic management is “unjustifiable”.

Speaking to Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking on Monday, Brown said he wants to fine Auckland Transport (AT) contractors who deliver “excessive and unnecessary” traffic management.

“It used to be ‘safety at reasonable cost,’ now it’s ‘safety at any cost’,” he told Hosking.

“You can hire those beautiful trucks covered in cones, plant them wherever you like, lay out cones and charge like hell and it’s got completely annoying.

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“I’ve had a couple of hissy fits, and they’re now listening to me now at the AT.”

Brown is under pressure to fill a forecasted $295m deficit in the Auckland Council budget.

Wayne Brown said spending $145m on road cones is unjustifiable.

RICKY WILSON/Stuff

Wayne Brown said spending $145m on road cones is unjustifiable.

He’s hoping to do that by addressing AT’s spend on road cones and traffic management, and wants a new “tailored and targeted” traffic management plan to achieve this.

As well as AT, he’s written to Chorus, Vector and Watercare about a “four-step approach” to reducing lane closures and road work cones, and meeting with the Councillors on their work to help.

“It’s been annoying me for a long time, even when I was back running Vector. It cost more to do the traffic management than actually laying the cables.”

He said contractors anger drivers so much, “they’ve created a road rage potential that could easily exceed whatever safety thing they’ve done in the first place.”

In October 2022, one Auckland commuter told Stuff his doctor diagnosed him with “PTSD-like symptoms” thanks to the traffic cones.

Electrician Greg Cramond commutes from Mangawhai, north of Auckland, and has to drive all across the city to jobs sites.

“It’s apocalyptic. Everywhere you go, there’s way too many traffic cones. I get that it’s a safety thing, but why do they stay delaying traffic even when no-one is there doing work?”

Contracting firm Fulton Hogan imports around 100 tonnes of traffic cones, around 20,000 of them, each year.

Estimator Beaudene Pumipi told Stuff no-one knew exactly how many road cones there were in the country, but the industry consensus was a cone for every Kiwi.

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