The Otago District Health Board will pay $35,000 towards the installation of traffic lights at the intersection of Helensburgh and Taieri Rds, near Wakari Hospital.
The Dunedin City Council hearings committee, which heard the board application for resource consent to redevelop existing Wakari Hospital buildings, decided the lights would address safety concerns raised at the hearing.
The committee granted consent to the board for the proposal which will also increase the car park capacity by 288.
The proposal is part of the board's multimillion-dollar master site project designed to address the lack of space at Dunedin Hospital and upgrade facilities which no longer meet national requirements.
The lights are expected to cost between $140,000 and $180,000.
The board will be required to pay its share by October 2009, when the greatest number of staff is relocated, or when the lights are installed, whichever is earlier.
The committee considered there was no reason to defer the occupation of the buildings until the lights were in place.
The committee was not convinced additional traffic associated with relocation of staff to Wakari Hospital would necessarily result in any substantive change to traffic around Wakari Primary School, one of the objectors to the proposal.
It suggested the school should have its traffic issues considered by raising them with the planning and environment committee.
More than half of the 10 submissions considered when the application was heard by the committee in June, raised issues about increased traffic.
Consent was granted subject to several conditions.
These included the contribution towards the lights, the submission of a traffic management plan for the construction phase and the layout, lighting and construction of car-parking areas.
