Infracom released its latest quarterly pipeline data update on 18 March 2020, before New Zealand’s COVID-19 lockdown. Below is the analysis from this date. We acknowledge that projects are being revised due to the pandemic and are working with organisations to ensure the information on our pipeline is up-to-date. We are also continuing to onboard new organisations.
Functional improvements
The pipeline has two new levels of project status. These are an ‘Early Planning’ status (pre-business case) and an ‘In-Planning’ status (business case or equivalent in development), allowing earlier visibility of upcoming projects.
The filter function has been improved to enable multiple selections in each filter. For example, users can now compare multiple organisations and/or multiple cost ranges.
Infracom received a significant increase in project contributions to the pipeline this quarter. In order to ensure a good user experience on the pipeline tool, projects under $300k are not included in the web viewer. These projects are still included in the analysis and are available in a downloadable CSV file.
Insights
As at 18 March, the pipeline contained data from 19 organisations, which have identified 2,290 projects between them. Together, these have an estimated value of $33.2 billion – significantly higher than last quarter’s combined estimated value of $21.1 billion. This is largely due to the New Zealand Upgrade Programme(external link) projects. Three high growth councils are also now included, with several projects in the Auckland region.
New Zealand Upgrade Programme
In December 2019 the Government announced a $12 billion programme of investment as part of the Half Yearly Fiscal Update. It outlined the first package of projects totaling $7.3 billion, in January 2020. Twenty-four of the projects from the announcement have been included in this update. These projects add up to $6.9 billion and include:
- all twelve roading projects
- all four rail projects
- one walking/cycling project
- seven health projects.
Note: The $400 million school maintenance programme and smaller health projects announced recently are not included.
High growth councils contributing
High growth councils Auckland Council, Hamilton City Council and Queenstown Lakes District Council (Three Waters programme only) are new additions to pipeline. Ports of Auckland and Wellington Airport (our first private sector contributor) have also begun providing their data.
A few big projects
Large projects make up a significant proportion of the estimated value of the pipeline. In this iteration 0.5 percent of projects are valued at over $500 million, representing around a third of the estimated pipeline value.
Transport remains the largest sector
Transport is the largest sector represented, comprising around half the estimated value of the pipeline. Water and health are next. This can partly be attributed to the data available at the time of publication.
Other changes
Twenty-three new Ministry of Education projects have been added to the pipeline. KiwiRail has expanded its original listing of two projects to eight — the Auckland Metro Rail Network Programme (now five projects) and the Rolling Stock Procurement Project (now three projects). Stages 6 and 7 of the Wellington Metro Rail Network Programme were also added to the pipeline for this third iteration. Below is a summary of organisations contributing to the pipeline.
| Organisation | Number of projects | Estimated value |
| Antarctica NZ | 1 | $100 – $250 million |
| Auckland Council | 1,644 | $1.64 billion |
| Department of Corrections | 11 | $1.39 billion |
| Hamilton City Council | 26 | $687 million |
| KiwiRail | 18 | $4.43 billion |
| Manawatu District Council | 14 | $252 million |
| Ministry of Education | 118 | $1.22 billion |
| Ministry of Health | 23 | $2.69 billion |
| Ministry for Primary Industries | 1 | $100 - $250 million |
| New Zealand Defence Force | 65 | $1.18 billion |
| New Zealand Transport Agency | 67 | $9.80 billion |
| Palmerston North City Council | 98 | $586 million |
| Ports of Auckland Limited | 8 | $252 million |
| Queenstown Lakes District Council | 35 | $225 million |
| Transpower | 9 | $1.02 billion |
| Watercare | 119 | $5.56 billion |
| Wellington International Airport Limited | 3 | $725 million |
| Wellington Water | 7 | $268 million |
| University of Otago | 23 | $881 million |
| Total | 2,290 | $33.24 billion |
Note: The estimate provided for the City Centre to Mangere Light Rail is the initial funding allocation of $1.8 billion as stated in ATAP, and therefore does not include the full estimated cost of the project. It is currently listed as an NZTA project while the Ministry of Transport runs a process to develop the NZTA and an alternative NZ Infra delivery option for Auckland’s rapid transit project. In the event that an alternative delivery partner is selected, we will update the pipeline to reflect the outcome. For more information see https://www.transport.govt.nz/land/auckland/atap/next-steps-on-auckland-light-rail/(external link)
