Rodney District Council joins the Traffic Management Unit

Rodney District Council has joined the Traffic Management Unit’s Joint Executive Group alongside Transit New Zealand, Auckland, Waitakere, Manukau and North Shore city councils in a bid to ease the region’s congestion challenges.

“Rodney District has unique roading requirements that have to combine the needs of large trucking companies with those of local residents, while also dealing with high levels of tourists at peak periods. By joining the Traffic Management Unit, with the other four councils, we are making a concerted effort to address the particular traffic problems we face and, ultimately, to improve our roads,” says Rodney District Mayor John Law.

The Traffic Management Unit (TMU) is unique in its integration of services to include motorway as well as arterial road monitoring and management across the region. The TMU runs the Auckland Traffic Management Centre (TMC), based in Northcote, employed 24 hours a day to provide facilities for operating all of Auckland’s motorways, state highways and urban arterials, as well as council roads controlled by signalised intersections.

With the aid of 128 closed circuit TV cameras and 11 Variable Message Signs (VMS), a team of 12 TMC operators respond to incidents and analyse the data produced by the Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS), an area-based traffic control system that responds to changes in traffic flow by adjusting traffic signal green time. A dedicated traffic website – http://www.trafficnz.info – provides direct, up to the minute communication to motorists.

“Our vision is for an innovative traffic management system bringing together the technologies of multiple partnerships to create the optimum integrated traffic management system for the whole Auckland region. We are therefore delighted that Rodney District Council has come on board,” says Transit Traffic Management Unit Manager Stephen Burnett.

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