Mokorua Gorge residents living either side of Gorge Road in Whakatane are having to wear earplugs at night to counter noise from the recently resurfaced road.

Mokorua Parade homeowners Hugh Marshall and his neighbour Peter Botterill have put together a petition signed by every resident in their street and several on Mokorua Grove, on the opposite side of Gorge Road, expressing their dissatisfaction with the resurfacing.

Their issue is the use of rough stone chip for resealing, rather than the smoother tarmac or asphalt concrete, used on other parts of the road.

'Gorge Road is smooth tarmac all the way up the hill, and then changes to rough chip just as it reaches the area where it has houses on either side,” Mr Marshall told Local Democracy Reporting.

In the petition to the council, the residents said the stone chip surface was 'considerably louder than the older surface”.

'When multiplied with the high volume and nature of the traffic and the current speed limit it makes it intolerable for residents.”

Another concern is the unevenness of the new surface, particularly where it joins the old surface. This is causing loud crashing noises, accompanied by shaking and vibrations in some properties, particularly with large vehicles.

'It feels like an earthquake. Large trucks are supposed to take State Highway 2 but a lot of them sneak through here in the middle of the night. They go much faster than the 60kmh speed limit.”

Team leader strategy and asset management Ann-Elise Reynolds says she empathises with the residents but they can rest assured that, given time, the situation will resolve itself.

'The chip seal used to reseal Gorge Road earlier this year is of the same type used on the road previously. When chip seal is new, it is rougher as it hasn't been worn down and embedded into the bitumen yet. As it ages, this will occur, and road noise will reduce.”

She says there isn't any way to avoid creating a small bump between the old seal and the new.

'You're adding a new layer of seal and that will always be higher than the existing road. We've investigated the bump here and unfortunately there isn't any way to lessen the bump without actually making it worse. Again, the bump will lessen as the road ages.”

She says roads in the district are measured for roughness and bumpiness every year and this road is well within the limits.

'When sealing roads, asphaltic concrete (AC) is only used for high-stress areas like intersections, tight corners and steep hills. This is because, while it handles strong forces from travelling vehicles, it is 10 times the price of chip seal. Not only does the product cost more, but there is more work needed to prepare the underlying surface as AC doesn't have the same flexibility as chip seal and will crack if the underlying surface hasn't been prepared correctly. As this section of Gorge Road is straight and flat it doesn't meet the requirements for AC.”

With regard to lowering the speed limit, Ann-Elise says any speed changes needs to go through a public consultation process.

"The whole country is currently going through a speed management review due to new legislation brought in by the Government as part of Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency's Road to Zero Strategy. The council is kicking off this work by working with schools and kura around speed limit changes outside their gates. Public consultation on these potential changes is planned for later this year and the council will be looking at wider speed changes in 2023. More information on this can be found at Whakatane.govt.nz/speed-review.”

-Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.