A popular tourist and trucking route in the Marlborough Sounds needs widening due to blind spots and trucks crossing the centre line, a new report says.
The report by Sentec, commissioned by Marlborough Roads, looked at the safety of heavy commercial vehicles, particularly logging trucks, on Port Underwood Rd and Queen Charlotte Dr.
Marlborough District Council’s infrastructure and community facilities committee heard recommendations from the report on Tuesday.
The report was originally commissioned following “numerous” complaints of trucks forcing residents’ vehicles onto the road shoulder or off the road entirely.
Sentec did an in-depth analysis of the two routes, including observations from inside a 23m logging truck.
On Port Underwood Rd, from Waikawa to Port Underwood, the trucks were unable to keep to their own lane at all, the report said.
Truckies and locals warn each other, tourists unaware
Discussions with truck drivers revealed they often used their radios to forewarn each other of their movements along the road, a system that had been adopted by some of Port Underwood’s residents too.
However, there was no way visitors and tourists could be aware of this method, the report warned.
Marlborough Roads transport recovery manager Steve Murrin told the council the radio channel was about to be shut down “unless [council] want to take it over”.
“I’m getting some pricing on that just to see what that involves,” Murrin said.
On Queen Charlotte Dr from Havelock to Linkwater, empty trucks were generally able to keep to their own lane, though there were a few times where they crossed the centre line, made worse when the truck was towing a trailer.
On both routes, a driver’s view around bends was often obstructed by vegetation, and there was minimal warning of oncoming logging trucks, only a lone non-standard warning sign on each road, the report said.
“International research has demonstrated that a driver will, [in] general, have forgotten a warning sign within 2km of the warning.”
The report recommended trucks continue to use the routes, but precautions would need to be taken to ensure road safety.
In the medium to long term, the report recommended the council look at widening the road where possible, and install truck detection systems linked to active “Wide Vehicle Ahead” signs, the report said.
In the meantime, the vegetation lining these routes should be cut back to allow for more visibility, and wide vehicle warning signs be installed at least every 2km. Curve widening should also take place at “easy-to-achieve locations”.
Murrin said the short term recommendations could be achieved within the existing budget, with costing already under way for new signs.
“There’s no reason we can’t get straight into vegetation works, and then carry that on and get that completed early in the year,” Murrin said.
Tourists confronted by logging truck
Mayor Nadine Taylor said she was disappointed the issue had taken so long to come to the council table.
“I certainly asked for this report to actually be initiated when we had two young German tourists go over the side of the Port Underwood hill.”
Taylor said the German tourists had come face-to face with a logging truck in January 2024 and, without any knowledge of the road, had driven off the hill. There were no injuries.
“That more than anything else showed that we had a real issue with this road,” she said.
The committee adopted all of the short-term recommendations and one medium-term recommendation by a unanimous vote.
Taylor suggested the council review the budget requirements for all the other recommendations at a later date.
Councillor Barbara Faulls said Port Underwood Rd was seeing a big uptick in traffic.
“You’ve got not just the logging trucks out there, you’ve got the mussel industry with their trucks,” Faulls said
“And there’s increased usage and increased knowledge, particularly by the visitor sector of that road, and so we’re seeing more hire cars, SUVs, campervans and cyclists on the road.
“In terms of the short term, I think that’s absolutely spot on with the vegetation control and the signage, and look forward to seeing that done.”
– LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
