Residents fear Auckland sinkhole a sign of wider problem with old infrastructure

The sinkhole that appeared on a street in Auckland's St Mary's Bay could take up to two months to repair, Watercare says.

Residents are concerned what the large sinkhole will do to ageing water infrastructure below.

The hole emerged on Thursday evening and is about 5m long, 3m wide and over a metre deep in parts.

Watercare said fixing it could take up to two months.

A heavy stream of water could be seen flowing through the hole, located in a dip on Hackett St.

Suction hoses were on Monday working hard to remove water pooling in the large hole in the middle of the road but water continued to gush down into a large gap space beneath the tarmac.

The section of road was damaged in the Auckland Anniversary floods in January 2023, after which it was covered by a metal plate.

On Thursday, the road appeared to have collapsed, with some residents reporting losing water for several hours.

Tony Skelton has lived in the area for 53 years.

"So for three years it's been lying in a condition which clearly shows that there are some infrastructural issues that could cause serious damage if left unattended," he said.

He's particularly concerned about what the sinkhole and flow of water with a 126-year-old emergency overflow point, or EOP, located beneath it.

"If there is further damage to the EOP that could undermine our properties, it could cause considerable problems."

Of particular concern is what would happen during the next heavy rain event.

"We are very concerned about it and we have been for years. The infrastructure here is a major concern to this suburb and no-one is listening to us about this."

John Hill from the St Mary's Bay Association said nobody knew the extent of the damage to the infrastructure since the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods.

"We are seriously concerned with this old infrastructure. We've had collapses in other parts of St Mary's Bay -- it's 126-years-old -- and it all arrives here at this EOP which is way down, it's seven metres down.

Hill said the issue demonstrated why the recently-approved Plan Change 120, which would allow for housing intensification in inner-Auckland suburbs, was a bad idea.

"They're zoning the whole of St Mary's Bay for six-storey buildings and they're planning to put it on old infrastructure," he said.

"This is a horrible indication that warns everybody that it can't be done."

Watercare chief operations officer Mark Bourne said it was investigating what caused the section of road to collapse above the pipes.

Water and wastewater services would remain online while the repair work was carried out .

Hackett St would be closed at the site of the hole, however, residents would still be able to access their properties.

He said these were significant infrastructure repairs and work was expected to take around two months.