Motorists travelling on the Tauranga Eastern Link last night are incensed after being wrongly redirected onto a toll road and charged.<\/p>\n
Drivers were given incorrect detour information during overnight works at the Wair\u0101kei (P\u0101p\u0101moa East) Interchange on the Tauranga Eastern Link Toll Rd.<\/p>\n
“Due to construction works, the northbound The Sands Ave onramp will be closed on 22 Jul, 2026 to 6 Nov, 2026 between 2000 and 0400,” it read.<\/p>\n
Southbound road users on The Sands Ave were advised to enter State Highway 2 via the Southbound Tauranga Eastern Link on-ramp, then exit SH2 via the off-ramp to Te Ara A Tia Rd, then turn on to Te Ara A Tia Rd, then U-turn to Kopura Rd \/ Te Ara A Tia Rd RAB, before rejoining SH2 via the on-ramp.<\/p>\n
Cars, motorcycles and light commercial vehicles weighing 3.5 tonnes or less passing through the Tauranga Eastern Link Toll Rd are charged a fee of $2.30, while heavy vehicles over 3.5 tonnes must fork over $5.60.<\/p>\n
In a Facebook group, one commenter said she was forced to overshoot the P\u0101p\u0101moa East off-ramp and pay the toll before backtracking to her original destination.<\/p>\n
“[It] would have been nice for them to have signs up in advance letting us know, right?” another added. <\/p>\n
National MP for Bay of Plenty Tom Rutherford said he was aware of the issue and had contacted the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi.<\/p>\n
The transport agency responded that it was “aware that incorrect detour information was provided during overnight works at the Wair\u0101kei (P\u0101p\u0101moa East) Interchange on the Tauranga Eastern Link Toll Road”.<\/p>\n
“As a result, some motorists were directed onto the toll road and may have incurred a toll charge.”<\/p>\n
Waka Kotahi said the issue was identified this morning “and has now been corrected for tonight\u2019s closure”. <\/p>\n
“We have reinforced the approved detour messaging with our contractor and are working with the tolling team to ensure any customers who were incorrectly directed onto the toll road are reimbursed.<\/p>\n
“We apologise for the inconvenience caused.”<\/p>\n
A planned closure of the westbound on-ramp, Paengaroa-bound, will go ahead between 8pm this evening and 4am tomorrow.<\/p>\n
A signed detour will be in place via local roads, using the Domain Rd Interchange to access the Tauranga Eastern Link Toll Rd. <\/p>\n
Motorists were asked to follow onsite signage and allow for extra travel time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Motorists travelling on the Tauranga Eastern Link last night are incensed after being wrongly redirected onto a toll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539902,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,43,139,69,1756,112],"class_list":["post-539901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-tauranga-bay-of-plenty","tag-transport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539901"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539901\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}