Fulton Hogan Ashburton has been awarded a five-year, $40.7 million operations and maintenance contract to look after the roading network in the Ashburton District.

Council has one of the five largest networks in the country, with 2,622km of roads (1,522km sealed), 188 bridges, 239 traffic islands and about 10,000 road signs.

The contract was awarded last week, after a robust evaluation process.

Group Manager of Infrastructure and Open Spaces Neil McCann said the evaluation stage involved staff and Councillors, and considered price and quality on an equal basis.

The new operations and maintenance contract begins on 1 December, and involves day-to-day maintenance work around the roading network, from filling potholes until they can be permanently repaired to replacing road signs, grading of unsealed roads, weed spraying and street sweeping in the townships and responding to emergency events.

The contract also consists of seasonal works such as sealed road digout repairs over the summer months, unsealed road maintenance metalling in the autumn, winter and spring, and ice gritting and snow clearing over the winter.

Mr McCann said the road network needs a lot of attention, as many roads are close to the end of their life.

“The challenge for us is to try and maintain the road network with limited funding, with priority given to work addressing road user safety.

“It is always a balance trying to maintain the condition of the network with the limited budget allocated, and our aim is to make our roads as safe as possible for everybody who uses them.”

The operations and maintenance contract is awarded every five years and the new document incorporates several updates aimed at improving service delivery for the community.

Mr McCann said these updates brought new challenges and required a slightly different approach to managing the network.

“Unfortunately, much like all councils in New Zealand, we don’t have sufficient funding to improve the condition of the whole network, so we have to focus on the worst sections of the network with the funds available.”