Can you make your way around the country via expedited transport, housing, energy and mining projects?

First released by Holdson’s Educational in 1955 and still available in “retro edition” at all good board game retailers, Tour of New Zealand invites players (two or more, aged 6+) to race their way around the the country, the path lined by scenic highlights (UK flags, power stations, cows, that sort of thing). It is a game of luck; skill is if anything a karmic disadvantage. My mother remembers well how we used to play it day after day when I was a child, and she remembers it with no fondness at all. 

To mark the release of the fast track list, and to freshly torment my mother, we have reworked Tour of New Zealand, modernised all the way into the near future, complete with a selection of the 149 projects up and down the motu that have been ushered into the business-class lane for New Zealand infrastructure signoff. 

To play, simply grab a playing piece, such as Freddy the frog or a twin-engine hydraulic excavator, replace the board squares with the text below and clench in your shaky fist one standard six-sided die. 

🎲 Good luck!

🎲 You luxuriate on the shores of the magnificent Lake Ōmāpere – the water north of Kaikohe restored by a local trust after decades of neglect. Advance five spaces.  

🎲 You cruise at 120kph down the Brynderwyn Bypass Super Highway. But wait, what’s this? A hefty toll. Roll 6 to move.

🎲 After discovering Coatesville market closed, you take a wrong turn and end up at Auckland (aka Pāremoremo) Prison. The maximum-security facility has been expanded from 681 to 1,200 prisoner capacity. Remain here until you roll a 7. 

🎲 You join tens of excited fans at the latest Blues rugby union clash at the revamped Eden Park 2.1, complete with its retractable roof. All is going well until you get caught up in a knife-fight on the concourse. The bass player from Six60 and a former prime minister are at odds over the optimal number of concerts per year. Go back to Pāremoremo.

🎲 Take a ride on the Avondale-Southdown Railway, do not pass Go Media Stadium. Enjoy the trip on a link that provides the “missing limb to Auckland’s heavy rail network” and clears the city lines of plenty of freight. At Southdown, change to a northbound commuter train and zip through Britomart into the City Rail Link – that was finished long ago, obviously, but not that tunnel you just zipped through, created as part of 42 Level Crossings Removal. Roll again!

🎲 It’s a hot and windy day in Waikato. Embark on an electric scooter circuit of renewable energy projects: the Rotokawa Solar Farm, the Hinuera Solar Farm, the Waikokowai Wind Farm and the Kaimai Wind Farm. Advance to Taupō, for free entry at the Super Loo. 

🎲 Head to Hawke’s Bay and drink a delicious glass of water from the Tukituki (formerly Ruataniwha) Water Security Scheme. The project, previously blocked by the courts, dams the Makaroro River in pursuit of water sustainability in a region which has had its hiccups. Roll to see how the sip goes down. If you get an even number, proceed to the miniature railway at Queen Elizabeth Park in Masterton. If it’s odd, go directly to hospital.

🎲 You arrive in Wellington and immediately happen upon a tunnel. It is a long tunnel. No, it is the long tunnel. “Come!” the long tunnel declaims. You journey deep into the fiery bowels of the earth, screaming around a subterranean Devon Street, gasping for breath as you rattle past the bowling lane beside the Beehive situation room deep in the basement, 400 storeys underground. Wayne Brown is playing a banjo atop a giant road cone. Tory Whanau is bursting water mains with a pencil. Simeon Brown is peeking out of a pothole. Casey Costello is handing out independent advice. They’re all trying to get to the airport for a Koru hour flight. Advance to the bucket fountain.

🎲 You fly out of Wellington Airport without getting wet or killed, thanks to the Southern Seawall Renewal. Advance to Motueka. 

🎲 Head to the Rolleston West Residential Development, 25km southwest of the Coolest City, to explore more than 4,000 new homes and four shopping malls. You get lost among the manicured hedges and questions about where you went to school; miss a turn. 

🎲 Project Kea sounds bloody lovely, but is this waste-to-energy plant up the road from Ōamaru, with its gargantuan incinerator creating power out of trash, an environmental boon or an environmental blight? Roll to find out. 

🎲 Throw on your best Luminaries bling and head to the Santana Minerals’ Bendigo-Ophir Gold Mine, where they’re well on the way to excavating from them there central Otago hills some $4.4bn of bullion, with the precious metal expected to one day be used to build a new hospital for Dunedin. Crack your knuckles and miss a turn.

🎲 Enjoy a sea fruit feast in Invercargill, gorging on the harvests of the Sanford Makarewa Salmon Hatchery (on the site of a former abattoir), the Impact Marine Salmon Farm and Ngāi Tahu’s Hananui Aquaculture Project, previously blocked by the Environmental Protection Authority owing to potential impacts including to Rakiura National Park. Pass out under the giant Gore brown trout. 

🎲 Jump on the new gondola to Coronet Village, a hub for alpine fun, complete with schools, 780 homes and access to ski fields. Recall wistfully the days when it used to actually snow. Miss a turn.

🎲 Marvel at the coal mines yawning out of the Buller Plateau, sites expanded and extended by the Buller Plateaux Continuation. Roll again and travel back that number of years.

🎲 At Picton, you wait for a ferry. You wait some more. It never arrives, having run aground on a Marlborough Sounds beach or a South Pacific reef. Enraged, you hurl your tomahawk into the ocean. Phew! Thanks to the High Voltage Direct Current Cable Replacement and Capacity Project, you do not sever the undersea cable and cut off power to the North Island. Roll again.

🎲 Shuttle past the various housing schemes of the Kāpiti Coast and directly to the Foxton Solar Project. Is it the biggest project of its kind? Not even close, even if this 40MWp solar farm should be able to power 7,000 homes. But you’ve wanted to come here ever since you saw the sign welcoming you to Foxton: The Fox Town. Crack open a Fizz and advance 2,000 spaces. 

🎲 In Taranaki, head directly for the overhauled Stratford Park, home to the A&P show, other public events, walkways and whatnot. Your reverie is interrupted by an lava-like influx of marine life seeking sanctuary from the Trans-Tasman Resources VTM project, which has overcome consent rejections and set about mining 50 million tonnes of material from the seabed. Bury your head in the sand and roll again.

🎲 Spend a day at Sunfield, the south Auckland creation of developer and Kāinga Ora bete noire Winton, which, despite the creepy name, paints a picture of modern living – an easily navigable township with everything you need to serve 3,400 houses and three retirement villages. Enjoy the 15-minute city and roll again before the cookers get you. 

🎲 Passing back through Tāmaki, you head for Auckland’s Downtown Carpark Building to take advantage of the affordable council parking and the labyrinthine stairwell network, only to find it’s been demolished and replaced by a pair of towers and a labyrinthine laneway network. Go to the Wilson’s and pay a thousand dollars.

🎲 Welcome to Marsden Point. There are new road and rail links to Northport. The port facilities have been expanded, the terminal redeveloped, a shipyard and dry dock appended. This is a glistening beacon of progress, an economic miracle. Even the ships seem to be smiling. The workers go about their work smoothly and efficiently and visitors marvel at the scenes, the mood enhanced by the music piped across the area – a sea shanty by Uncle Shane. You are the winner.