The Marlborough Roads Recovery Team has worked hard to get Queen Charlotte Drive reindeer ready.

By Christmas, nine of the 10 sites under construction are planned to be completed, with the last to be finished in the new year.

Works started in September with three road retreat sites, two near Cullen Point lookout and a third near Aussie Bay.

The underslip above Pukenui Road has also been filled to stabilise this section of road, using material taken from the road retreats, said Council’s Transport Recovery Advisor Steven Murrin.

“We undertook the sites concurrently so that we could recycle the fill taken from the retreats to go to the site above Pukenui,” he said.

A new culvert at the Pukenui site with a rock lined channel has also been installed, with rocks used to slow the velocity of the discharge water.

The road has since been stabilised and resealed, using a mixture of asphalt and chip seal surfacing.

Hydro-seeding has also been undertaken on several of the completed sites.

“Hydro-seeding is a faster and more efficient way to re-seed an area and helps with erosion and sediment reduction due to a polymer in the spray which binds the material and the topsoil particles together, Mr Murrin said.

Recovery crews have been busy in other areas of the networks with 80 per cent of the sites for this current phase of works completed.

In June, Waka Kotahi agreed to fund 95 per cent of $52.39M for the completion of Phase 2 recovery which includes complete of road repairs in the Awatere, Northbank and Waihopai areas. As well as high priority sites on Queen Charlotte. It also includes some repairs in the Sounds necessary to maintain access.

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