We were proud to work on Auckland Transport’s major infrastructure project, the Panmure to Pakuranga Eastern Busway.
The multi-billion-dollar project was built in three stages and included a new Panmure station and stretching the busway from Panmure to Pakuranga to Botany, connecting surrounding suburbs and eventually cutting travel time into the city in half.
The project required a suite of environmental management and mitigation plans under the Construction Environmental Management Plan. Arborlab was employed at the very start of the project, back in 2015, to prepare a tree management plan. This involved inspecting and assessing all trees along the proposed route and building sites, capturing the data of each tree digitally, and then laying them over the proposed plan to see how they’d interact. We used our effective systems and data collection systems to collect accurate data and to provide a comprehensive report for stakeholders. The report detailed all trees, and in particular which had possible conflicts and what the outcomes of those might need to be – for example, monitored works in the root zone, removal or other. That report included us highlighting the significance of each tree and the tree protections rules for each zone. 134 protected trees were identified within the vicinity of the works.
This detailed report was shared with stakeholders who used it to make decisions on the final works. Based on these final works, we reassessed the management plan and made recommendations on the effect of the trees and the course of action for each, including specific actions and suggested mitigation where tree removals could not be avoided.
Stage two was implementation during the construction stage. This saw us monitoring the activities around 79 trees and ensuring compliance with the approved recommendations and standards. This included directing tree contractors in removing trees and supervising construction contractors to ensure they didn’t damage trees. A final report was provided at the completion of this stage.
Like all construction projects, this infrastructure project involved specific induction training. To provide excellent continuous service to our client, we inducted multiple Arborlab team members to ensure that numerous team members could attend the site on any given day. This helped to avoid any hold-ups when several sites were operational at the same time.
Our large team of niche-trained monitoring arborists meant we could provide the support for this large project while also servicing the many other ongoing projects we are a part of.
We were proud to play a part in such a significant project that benefits so many today.
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If you’d like to talk to us about an infrastructure project, please get in touch – we’d love to help.