Last year we were approached by NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA) to develop a Road Closure Trailer for the Auckland Motorway Network. This was a joint collaboration with input from HEB Construction and Auckland System Management Alliance (ASM).

The challenge was to design an easily transportable, lightweight yet robust, highly-visible, safe, and simple to operate barricade that could quickly expand to cover anything from one to six motorway lanes. As you’d expect, there was an enormous amount of complex design and engineering to achieve a seemingly ‘simple’ solution.

Everyone involved was happy with the end product and we didn’t think any more about it until we received an email from NZTA advising that they had entered it into the Matrix Innovation Awards, held annually as part of the Engineering NZ Annual Transportation Conference.

We were delighted to be one of four finalists and ultimately to win the category which is widely considered the preeminent industry award in the road safety space in NZ. We have always maintained that, whatever industry you work in, good design makes a world of difference to the people using the product.