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There’s a new road surfacing strategy taking to the streets that’s reducing costs and lowering carbon emissions.

Council staff are continuously looking for new ways to maintain the 3,938 roads that stretch 2,473 kilometres across the network.

“We’ve heard from residents that we need to find new ways of maintaining our roads, and we’re always keeping an eye out for new innovations we can replicate in Christchurch,” says City Streets Manager Steve Guy.

“We tasked contractors with researching strategies overseas and finding alternative products we could implement.”

New road rejuvenator and micro surfacing products successfully brought into New Zealand from abroad are creating smoother road surfaces across the region, while lowering the cost to the environment and the Council.  

Introducing reduced energy asphalt has a carbon reduction of up to 20% at production and opens sites to traffic quicker, and a new holding strategy is producing stronger surfaces to maintain road quality.

“Products like these mean the Council can achieve more work within the same annual budget,” Mr Guy says.

New chipseal surfaces have been introduced and are proving popular with a 63% reduction in complaints to sweep newly resurfaced streets over the 2023/24 period.

 “Across the network we found temporary pothole repairs were failing quickly and we needed to find new ways of holding materials together,” Mr Guy says.

“That’s where our contractors came in with their own chipseal mats that can be applied over the top of potholes, ensuring water can’t get through and giving us a solid solution while waiting for a permanent fix.”

As part of the strategy the Council has developed the way of reacting to weather events, particularly when retaining structures are damaged, which has reduced the average construction time.

“Our next step is to move onto unsealed roads across the region, specifically in the Banks Peninsula area which has a network of 51% unsealed roads,” Mr Guy says.

“We’re currently working with contractors to target innovations being used overseas and seeing how we can replicate these, and we’re excited to bring these new products to the table.

“This new strategy is a significant step forward in terms of meeting the needs of residents and being able to be more reactive across the network.”