New Zealand State Highway 2

State Highway SH2 in New Zealand
map
Basic data
Operator:	New Zealand Transport Agency
Start of the street:	Pokeno ( 37 ° 14 '  S , 175 ° 1'  O )
End of street:	Ngauranga , Wellington ( 41 ° 15 ′  S , 174 ° 49 ′  E )
Overall length:	968 km
Regions :	Waikato Bay of Plenty Gisborne Hawke's Bay Manawatu-Wanganui Wellington
State Highway 2 , bridge over the Mohaka River  Map with all coordinates: OSM | WikiMap map

The New Zealand State Highway 2 ( State Highway 2 or SH 2 for short ) is a trunk road of national importance on the North Island of New Zealand .

geography

The highway has a length of 968 km, the second longest highway in the country and is only exceeded by the total length of State Highway 1 , which, however, extends over both islands. The SH 2 is longer than the section of the SH 1 on the North Island. It runs first in a south-easterly, later in a south-westerly direction over a large part of the North Island . It supplies the areas on the east coast, while SH 1, which runs further to the west, supplies the western parts of the island. It connects Auckland and Wellington via Hawke's Bay with the cities of Napier and Hastings , Gisborne and the Bay of Plenty including Tauranga .

Over the greater part of the route, the SH 2 is comparable to a German federal highway with one lane in each direction and has level crossings and property entrances.

The busiest section of SH 2 is to the north of the Ngauranga Interchange in Wellington, where an average traffic volume of 62,000 vehicles per day was measured at km 977.6. The quietest section of the route is near Otoko in the Gisborne District , where an average of just 1,000 vehicles per day drive at kilometer 375.

Routing (as of 2008)

The SH 2 branches off from the SH 1 north of Pokeno , about 49 km south of downtown Auckland . It initially runs east, crosses the Hauraki Plains and then passes through the Karangahake Gorge , a cut in the hills between the Coromandel Peninsula and the Kaimai Range . From the 'gold city' of Waihi it runs southeast to Tauranga Harbor . He follows its coast and reaches the city of Tauranga . Here the SH 2 runs over the 'Tauranga Harbor Link', which was inaugurated at the end of 2009, past the harbor through the industrial part of Mount Maunganuis. Next through the Kiwi town of Te Puke, where some kilometers later at Paengaroa of State Highway 33 in the direction of domestic Rotorua branches. The road now follows the coast in a south-easterly direction until it reaches the village of Matata for about 60 km from Tauranga .

From here, the SH 2 curves for about 90 km into the hinterland of the coast. South of Whakatāne it crosses the Rangitaiki Plains and is crossed by State Highway 30 . It now runs southeast over Taneatua , through the Waimana Gorge and then swings north to reach the coast of the Bay of Plenty just before Opotiki . Behind Opotiki the road leads south inland. The State Highway 35 branches off from Opotiki and follows the coastline to the east.

The SH 2 follows the valley of the Waioeka River in a southerly direction and winds up the 725 m high summit of Traffords Hill . From here it leads to the Waipaoa River and follows its valley from Te Karaka to Makaraka , just before Gisborne . The SH 2 is connected to Gisborne by a short section of the SH 35 , which meets the SH 2 again here.

The SH 2 runs near the coast in a southerly direction, passes the Wharerata Forest and the base of the Mahia Peninsula . At Nuhaka he reaches the coast of Hawke Bay and follows it for about 30 km in a westerly direction to Wairoa . There the SH 35 branches off to the north. It crosses the Waihua River near its mouth and makes a curve inland past the Mohaka Forest and Lake Tutira . In Waihua he reaches the coast again. He moves away from the coast again and bypasses the coastal mountain range of the Rocky Range , he crosses the Mohaka River and leads along the west bank of Lake Tutira. Between Wairoa and Tutira, the road route is accompanied by the Palmerston North Gisborne Line , one of the main routes on the North Island.

The SH 2 reaches the coast of Hawke Bay again and is connected to the SH 5 here . The highway now runs through the nearby cities of Napier and Hastings .

From Hastings, the road leads southwest to Waipukurau inland, then turns briefly west and follows a tributary of the Tukituki River upstream. Then the route leads to the southwest and crosses the hill country that forms the upper part of the catchment area of ​​the Manawatu River . In Woodville , the SH 2 meets the SH 3 , which connects it to the city of Palmerston North via Manawatu Gorge . The SH 2 continues south through the Wairarapa , crosses Eketahuna and reaches Masterton .

The final 100 kilometers pass through several small Warapara towns such as Carterton , Greytown and Featherston . Then it leads over a winding, steep section over the Remutaka Range with a summit height of 555 m into the Hutt Valley . The highway runs along the outskirts of Upper Hutt , Lower Hutt and Petone , grazes the northern part of Wellington Harbor and then ends at the Ngauranga Interchange with State Highway 1, three miles from downtown Wellington.

Although the Ngauranga Interchange is the official end of SH 2 , it is signposted eight kilometers further to the Mount Victoria Tunnel .

Branches

The State Highway 2 has two short branches: the State Highway 2A leads over 2.1 km from the SH 2 in Tauranga at the intersection with SH 23 in Maungatapu. The State Highway 2B is 4.1 km long and connects the SH 2 at Napier Airport with State Highway 50 in Taradale . This route is part of the Hawke's Bay Expressway .

Changes to the route

The SH 2 once also ran through Whakatāne in the Bay of Plenty area, but this section was moved inland via Edgecumbe and Awakeri, the old section of the route is now part of State Highway 30 . The State Highway 2 in the center of Upper Hutt followed the Fergusson Drive , this part was in the 1980's by the River Road bypassed. The south end of SH 2 was also changed. It was the southern part of the Wellington Urban Motorway when the SH 1 ended at the Aotea Quay exit . In 1996 the SH 1 replaced this southern section of the SH 2 .

In Mangatawhiri there was an accumulation of accidents on a section of SH 2 . Therefore, a seven-kilometer bypass route was built around the place. Here, overtaking routes were set up on the otherwise single-lane road to enable safe overtaking. Since December 2008 the crossings are free of elevations.

literature

• New Zealand Travel Atlas , Wise Maps Auckland ISBN 0-908794-47-9 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ State Highway traffic data booklet: 2007-2011. (PDF; 7.4 MB) NZ Transport Agency , accessed on October 7, 2012 (English).