Infrastructure Alliance

02/05/2022

 

Historically the Hamilton City Council reseal programme had been delivered utilising a typical stop and go traffic management  ethos. During the FY20/21 construction season, the Infrastructure Alliance (IA) planned to complete a large percentage of their  renewals programme under road closures. Road closures allow for projects to be completed more efficiently, productively and  safely, both for the work teams and travelling public alike.

 

As a result of the separation road closures create, work crews can use the full road corridor which minimise the risk of  unplanned people and plant interaction, as well as allowing the potential for multiple activities to be completed within the same  closure. This means that many activities that are normally staggered over several months with frequent and repetitive traffic  management, are completed at the same time, thereby reducing congestion and maintaining typical travel time reliability.

Challenge

To ensure that road closures are a success, it is critically important to explain the ‘why’ to customers in advance so they  understand the rationale for the works, as well as allowing them sufficient time to explore alternative routes prior for the day of  closure. This is doubly as important for residents or businesses who reside within planned closures. These key stakeholders  need to have a clear and constant understanding of how their “day to day” routines will continue unhindered by the works, which  requires targeted clear communication and progress updates.

 

The key to success is ensuring good advanced communication with any bus companies, ensuring bus routes can remain open  and residents have access throughout the work activities. Experience has shown that the number of residential vehicles is  reduced and of those that do arrive during a road closure, most usually leave and come back once works have been completed  and the road re-opened.

Solution / outcomes

Under a traditional stop/go traffic management set up, the  Surfacing team would plan to typically complete 2 or 3  sealing sites per day. Whereas with road closures being  the preferred means, the number of sites completed in a  day increased to between 4 and 5.

 

For the delivery of the 2021/22 reseal programme, the  team are attempting to use closures for up to 90% of the  programmed sites, which can generate savings of up$15,000 per day.

Productivity and Cost Savings

The positive cost impact of adopting road closures as a  preferred means of delivery, resulted in the Infrastructure  Alliance generating cost savings for Hamilton City Council  of approximately $90,000.

 

The average temporary traffic management cost per site  totalled $1,027 (across 82 sites), by adopting road closures  as a primary approach we were able to negate the need for  16 site specific traffic management setups (at a saving of

 

$16,000) and reduce the programme duration by a total of  5 days, resulting in a total programme saving of  approximately $90,000.