Concern hotline will increase abuse

Otago Daily Times

03-06-2025

The government's war on road cones is "just fuel thrown on the fire" for road workers already suffering regular abuse, a Dunedin traffic management company boss says.
Yesterday, Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden launched a 12-month pilot of a road cone hotline to investigate "instances of over-compliance in temporary traffic management", as part of changes to government regulator WorkSafe.
The owner of a Dunedin traffic management company, who the Otago Daily Times has agreed not to name, said the hotline was "pretty out of the gate".
"I just think it's very much noise — a great one for the politicians to bang on about."
Abuse towards road workers was "systemic" and in the most extreme cases, often further north, workers had been threatened with knives or guns.
"The biggest thing we train on is de-escalating conflict," the owner said.
"This has just trumped it ... ultimately, it's fuelling a risk that we've only just ever managed."
Traffic management was needed when essential work such as water or power maintenance was being carried out — something people overlooked.
"A new university building, a new hospital — it's just 'bloody road cones'.
"If people don't know the bones of what [the hotline's] trying to achieve — and there are some good things of what it's trying to achieve — they don't look into that.
"They just see, 'oh, these f ...... road cones'.
"It's just fuel thrown on the fire."
He wanted to know how the scheme's success would be measured and who was liable if, for example, a vehicle drove through a work site due to a lack of road cones.
A traffic management plan signed off by key stakeholders was already required for work sites, which included details of the number and spacing of cones used, he said.
If not adhered to, a company could be audited or shut down.
The hotline could "balance" those who put out more cones than a traffic management plan required, but he thought it was uncommon, as operators wanted to make the best use of their resources.
In a statement, WorkSafe chief executive Sharon Thompson said the pilot aimed to reduce unnecessary cones on the road.
"While cones are primarily there to manage the speed and flow of traffic and help keep everyone safe, there can be times when usage is excessive.
"We will engage with those involved with temporary traffic management and provide information to influence them to take a more risk-based approach to the use of cones on the road."
Ms van Velden did not respond to questions before yesterday's deadline.
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