Ashburton Mayor Neil Brown is backing the Government’s new road cone hotline, calling it a good move to reduce excessive use of temporary traffic management.

The mayor plans his own crack down in the Mid Canterbury district, with contractors potentially facing a $10 fee for every road cone left behind after work is completed.

The Government launched the hotline last week for the public to report overuse of orange cones during road works.

“Anything to identify the overuse of road cones is good,” Brown said.

“When there are too many used, people become complacent with them, and they lose the effectiveness.”

Excessive road cone use was a hot topic in Ashburton last year during work on the new kerb and channel at the Ashburton Domain along Walnut Avenue – with councillor Carolyn Cameron calling it “road cone mania gone bonkers”.

Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden said the hotline will be supported by an engagement programme with NZTA and industry to promote a risk-based approach to traffic management.

Council’s infrastructure and open spaces group manager Neil McCann said the number of cones is up to the contractor and how they decide to manage the risk on site.

He said the traffic management costs, including cones, range between 5-15% of a project budget and is not directly related to the number of cones used.

The council is set to get stricter on road contractors with tighter supervision of site management, especially overnight and at weekends, he said.

The Government hotline is cracking down on the number of cones being used during the work, while Ashburton’s new road cone fee aims to curb the ones being left behind when the work is complete.

“The abandoned fee is for the ones left behind. When there’s no work going on, no pothole, or signs, but it’s just there," Brown said.

“Road cones are a warning device and if they are left lying around they give the public a false perception that there is a risk when there’s not a safety issue.”

The fee has been included in Ashburton's 2025/26 annual plan, set at $10 per abandoned cone, but the finer details are still to be worked out, he said.

By Jonathan Leask