Traffic congestion on State Highway 2, near Katikati, has boosted the awareness of the need of a bypass.

Community board chair Jenny Hobbs' has launched a petition following numerous traffic complaints this summer.

The townsfolk are a bit cynical about the promises coming out of the NZTA, says Jenny.

'They're moving things along but the people in the town are cynical. They feel quite powerless and they have been there before, and thought that we had the job done, all to no avail.

'And so no one is prepared really now to say that we think this is going to have a positive outcome, sadly."

NZ Transport Agency Bay of Plenty state highways manager Mark Haseley says Transport Minister Simon Bridges asked the agency to take a fresh look at the Katikati section of the Waihi to Tauranga programme.

'Since July 2016, we have been looking at the transport issues and community aspirations in Katikati with our partners and local stakeholders,” says Mark. 'By mid-2017 we expect the community will have clarity about the changes that will be made.”

Jenny says they've been there before.

Jenny Hobbs: Katikati was promised a bypass before.Supplied photo.

'Roger Stiles was involved in the previous push for the bypass when it almost happened, and they bought the land and Mayor Graeme Wells went to wellington to sign off on the contract.

'He thought it was a done deal, and when he got to Wellington the NZTA team was different and they sent him home empty handed," says Jenny.

'I'm not sure of the date 2008, 2009. That was when the land was purchased and that was when Katikati really thought that it was a goer. They had worked hard on it for two years.”

Residents believe this is their last chance at getting a traffic bypass out of the New Zealand transport agency, says Jenny.

'We really feel that this is the year. If it doesn't happen this year with the effort that's gone in and the intensity of the traffic on the Katikati community, and without the bypass we are doomed to be just that dirty industrial strip with the town quite dysfunctional.

'We can't maintain quality retail, no quality social space, and it's a nightmare really.”

Summer traffic woes are so bad that a normal four to five minute journey into town, takes an hour.

For Katikati people the holiday has been a misery because of the bedlam. People stay home, they don't go to the beach or shopping, says Jenny.

Each time the pedestrian lights in town stops the high intensity holiday traffic it backs up, and over a period of time the queuing from both sides of town lengthens.

'Through the holiday period the queue that was hardly moving, was all the way back to the Athenree turn off to Waihi Beach.

'Just at a standstill. We live on Lindeman Road so we couldn't just think ‘Oh, I'll pop down to town to get something – because you can't. It took me an hour to get into Katikati from my home on Lindeman road which is normally a four minute drive.

'But if there was a bypass the traffic would be able to keep flowing through on the bypass without having to stop, so you wouldn't get that build up.”

Recent accidents have resulted in more people signing the on line petition, started in August.

There are more than 930 signatures, in addition to another 1700 signatures collected on paper.

Jenny says the petition received a boost following the two hour road block caused by a recent accident, but the Katikati congestion is unrelated. When there's an accident there is one lane free. Normally both are gridlocked.

'If there was a bypass the traffic backed up from the accident would build up along the bypass and the town centre itself would be unaffected by traffic at a stand-still, a line of traffic right through the centre of town in a two hour wait.”

They hope to present the petitions to Simon Bridges before the next round of public consultation on the SH2 upgrades.

The Katikati grid lock. Photo: Supplied.