{"id":552552,"date":"2026-07-31T06:29:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T06:29:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/552552\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T06:29:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T06:29:10","slug":"smooth-subdivision-roads-face-a-cheaper-makeover","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/552552\/","title":{"rendered":"Smooth subdivision roads face a cheaper makeover"},"content":{"rendered":"

Residents of Tasman\u2019s new subdivisions might like their asphalted roads, but the looming $7 million replacement bill means they likely won\u2019t be asphalted forever.<\/p>\n

By Max Frethey for Local Democracy Reporting<\/p>\n

The region\u2019s rapid growth over recent years has seen new neighbourhoods crop up where once there had been fields.<\/p>\n

Tasman District Council\u2019s transportation manager, Jamie McPherson, said developers were frequently opting to asphalt their subdivisions\u2019 roads, during a Thursday workshop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese roads\u2026 provide a smooth, high-quality, attractive service. Residents love it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cDevelopers pay a little bit more upfront compared with just chip-sealing on the road, and everyone lives quite happily ever after, until we come to resurface them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asphalt is the smooth, black roading surface. It was a thick layer of bitumen \u2013 the black, tar-like substance used to build roads \u2013 mixed with crushed aggregates, such as gravel and sand.<\/p>\n

Chipseal, however, is the rougher roading surface<\/a>. It was made with a thin layer of bitumen and a layer of stones \u2013 the chip \u2013 on top.<\/p>\n

As time passes and the roads deteriorate, replacing the old asphalt with a new batch will generate significant costs for the council.<\/p>\n

\"Chipseal<\/p>\n

Chipseal was about four times cheaper than asphalt, but asphalt was popular because it was smooth and quiet. (Source: Local Democracy Reporting)<\/p>\n

The New Zealand Transport Agency currently subsidises 51% of Tasman\u2019s roading costs, but McPherson said the agency generally only funded \u201cthe lowest feasible cost solution\u201d.<\/p>\n

Asphalting was about four times as expensive per square metre, with chip-sealing costing around $10 while asphalting was around $40.<\/p>\n

Asphalt was typically expected to last for 30 years, twice as long as chip-seal, which would still make asphalt the more expensive option even accounting for their respective lifetimes.<\/p>\n

Many of the asphalted roads in the district\u2019s new subdivisions did not meet the daily vehicle number of 10,000 that was typically used to determine if a residential road should be asphalted.<\/p>\n

McPherson identified 27km \u2013 or 324,000 square metres \u2013 of asphalted residential streets that carried fewer than 5000 vehicles a day.<\/p>\n

With NZTA expected to only provide 51% of the cost of doing the cheapest option \u2013 chip-sealing \u2013 that would only cover 12.75% of the cost of re-installing asphalt.<\/p>\n

That would leave the council with $7 million of cost to re-asphalt those roads over the next 30 years as they reached the end of their life.<\/p>\n

The annual asphalt cost was low in the near future but would ramp up from about the 2040s as today\u2019s new pavements began to fail, creating bills of \u201caround a million dollars a year\u201d.<\/p>\n

McPherson recommended that the council begin working on a policy that would ensure future road resealing would be evidence-based, with chip-seal being the default unless stressors and network importance required a road be asphalted.<\/p>\n

The key problem to such a policy was that residents were likely to be reluctant to see their asphalted roads replaced with chip-seal.<\/p>\n

P\u0101p\u0101moa residents made national headlines in late 2025 after Tauranga City Council moved to chip-seal old, asphalted streets.<\/p>\n

\u201cAsphalt roads last quite well and are very popular. People really like them,\u201d McPherson said.<\/p>\n

Particularly, asphalt was quieter to drive over.<\/p>\n

However, workshop chair Richmond councillor Kit Maling did not think that increased noise would be a problem for many and said an eventual shift to chip-sealing made \u201ceconomic sense\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are new subdivisions. So, your insulation and your noise suppressant double glazing is a lot better than in the old houses.\u201d<\/p>\n

McPherson added that using a smaller chip would reduce the noise level as well.<\/p>\n

The council indicated its support for continued work in developing a policy that would codify the approach that would see low-traffic asphalted roads replaced with chip-seal at the end of their life.<\/p>\n

\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Residents of Tasman\u2019s new subdivisions might like their asphalted roads, but the looming $7 million replacement bill means…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552553,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[91,111,43,139,69],"class_list":["post-552552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-nelson","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552552","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=552552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}