The New Zealand Transport Agency has apologised to road users for "unacceptable" delays in the Kawarau Gorge today.
In a statment, NZTA said drivers and passengers on State Highway 6 between Arrowtown and Cromwell faced long delays of up to an hour-and-a-half today when planned roadworks coincided with the unexpected closure of the Crown Range Road.
Heavy rain caused a slip and a boulder to become unstable, threatening road users on the Crown Range which links Queenstown and Wanaka. The road was closed for safety reasons on Wednesday afternoon.
NZTA said two pieces of work were under way in the Central Otago gorge on Friday.
They were the resealing of the road at Goldfields - 1.5 km of resealing/rehabilitation in the gorge, which began three weeks ago, and rock scaling at Nevis Bluff from midday until 2pm.
“The Transport Agency sincerely apologises to everyone held up in the Kawarau Gorge today,” Graeme Hall, NZ Transport Agency system manager, said.
NZTA said the unacceptably long delays today compared to earlier shorter delays associated with the Goldfields resealing, due to the Crown Range/Cardrona route being closed, meant the Kawarau Gorge became the only route between Arrowtown and Cromwell.
It was not anticipated that the Crown Range Road would be unexpectedly closed at the same time as this work was taking place and this created the backlog.
“A number of people phoned the Transport Agency to complain about the traffic backlog and we acknowledge that resealing in the gorge should have been paused earlier to release the pressure on the network,” Mr Hall said.
Although the planned work was advertised in advance to freight companies and other regular users of the highway, the combination of the Crown Range unplanned event and the effects upon traffic was not anticipated, and these effects and delays should have been minimised earlier, NZTA said.
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