JOHN MCLEAN: We are going backwards big time
- Administrator
- Jun 25
- 2 min read
Near where I live the authorities are constructing a roundabout on the junction of State Highway 1 and the off road down to Waitarere Beach.
At this point SH1 is single lanes each way and the surrounding land is flat, open farmland without trees. It could not be easier for building a simple roundabout.
Construction started on 29 October, 2025, and the Ministry is now crowing that it will be all finished in November, 2026. Thirteen months to build a roundabout in the most ideal conditions and on one of the busiest roads (SH1) where one would have thought speed of the essence so as not to hold up traffic.
In 1881 my great, great-grandfather, also John McLean and a contractor, built a good, strong bridge over Cox's Creek in Auckland in one month. In the same year he built the Whatawhata Bridge in the Waikato. It was a truss bridge extending from steep bank to steep bank. At 520 feet long it consisted of two 80 foot spans (each supported on 16 piles of totara), seven 40 foot spans (each on 8 piles) and four 20 foot spans (each on 6 piles). Some fifteen tons of iron were used while the approaches on each side were sodded and metalled, the roadway being fourteen feet wide. And how long did it take to do all this in a remote area and with hand tools before the age of machinery? SEVEN MONTHS.
So, we have progressed from building a large bridge in seven months to laying out a roundabout on flat land in double that time. In those days things were built by lions; to-day they are built by donkeys.
John McLean is the author of the recently published book, "The British Empire; A Force For Good".
Suggest use overseas contractors, an example of a recent super highway from Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville built by the Chinese.
Build time: ~3.5 years
Cost: ~$2 billion
Length: ~187–190 km
Opened: October 2022
If they must build a roundabout, why dont they make them an oval that favours the biggest traffic flow. Building big roundabouts like that are an unnessesary restriction on traffic flow
NZ road construction is a horror story and has been for many years. Why not give this work to overseas contractors? The Swiss for example resealed 7km of a main arterial road along the lakeside from Vésenaz to central Geneva in 3 days - a route of two lanes both ways carrying an average of 33 vehicles a minute between 6.00am and 8pm.
As a retired Construction Manager, doing the building is the easy bit! Navigating the politics, the Greenies, the Safety Gestapo, the native heritage people etc, etc - that's what takes the time! Core business is easy - it's the fluff that gets in the way!
I watched them building the Puhoi to Warkworth motorway - Oh, how I was tempted to apply for a job!!!! The frustration of watching procrastination!
John, I guess that back then less time was bound up in meeting regulations, safetyism and ensuring that hundreds of orange cones and lots of traffic managers were engaged on the project, that due iwi consultation had taken place and possibly a taniwha appeased? All of this and a simply slow pace of construction today - we cannot excuse the terrible inefficiency of our public works. I am in rural France right now and have observed within the last month the local road building team for our region doing urgent major retaining wall works and road rebuilding over a ~80-metre stretch on a hillside highway bend which had subsided dangerously. The road was closed with diverted traffic for just …