All southbound lanes of the Auckland Harbour Bridge into the city centre will be closed to all traffic from 9pm overnight Tuesday 22 September to allow emergency repairs to be made. This will include bus lanes. The closure will be in place from 9pm to 5am and includes:
During the closure, there will be no north or southbound bus services over the bridge. Routes NX1, NX2, 82, 95 and 97 will start and end trips at Akoranga Station. You will need to catch a ferry to/from Birkenhead and shuttle buses will take you to Akoranga Station to resume your trip.
Ferries to Birkenhead depart Pier 1 at the Downtown Ferry Terminal.
Extra ferry sailings this evening:
If work is unable to be fully completed on the night of 22 September, further southbound closures will take place overnight, Wednesday 23 September to allow the work to be finished.
There are plenty of seats available on trains, buses and ferries making public transport a great option for traveling around the region, and particularly in and out of the city centre, while work is being done on Harbour Bridge.
Buses are still running to and from the city however buses will be delayed as they join the queues to cross the bridge. We advise you plan your journey with the AT Mobile app, which now also displays how many people are on a bus or train service at any given time, or use the journey planner on our website.
We will be increasing the frequency of bus services outside of peak hours so you can take advantage of our 30% off-peak fare discount. Ferries are operating as usual and have spare seating capacity.
Remember that face coverings must be worn while on public transport, register your AT HOP card and scan the on-board QR code with the Ministry of Health’s COVID Tracer app.
We looked into how many passengers we can carry on bus routes that go across the Harbour Bridge and found that:
These numbers are for seats only and there is room for about 10% more people when standing.
North Shore ferries will be using the largest vessels available.
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency and Auckland Transport are implementing a bus priority system that will be implemented before evening peak traffic on State Highway 1 northbound to the Auckland Harbour Bridge. The priority lane is to reduce congestion for buses to the North Shore and provide more reliable journeys for customers.
This bus priority system will allow buses to access the SH1 northbound on-ramp at Fanshawe Street via a new priority lane, allowing buses to bypass the queuing traffic.
This priority lane onto the motorway will then merge with the general state highway traffic.
If you do need to travel between the city and the North Shore, consider using alternative travel options such as taking public transport, or use the Western ring route - state highway 20, state highway 16 and state highway 18.
View current travel times on the Waka Kotahi / NZ Transport Agency Auckland motorways traffic dashboard.
We know many of you don’t have a lot of choice about and when you travel, so we appreciate your ongoing patience and understanding during the disruption.
For more information visit Waka Kotahi / NZ Transport Agency: Auckland motorway travel times , Twitter , Facebook , and media releases.
Read our Harbour Bridge media briefing.