MAIN TRUNK RAILWAY.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19975, 9 July 1930, Page 4

MAIN TRUNK RAILWAY.

CONSTRUCTION WORK. GOOD PROGRESS BEING MADE. OVER FIVE HUNDRED MEN EMPLOYED. s Fivo hundred and thirty men are engaged in joining up the dead ends of the South Island Main Trunk Railway, which are Beventy-fivo miles apart. Of these two hundred and ninety are working from the Wharanui side and two hundred and forty from Parnassus.

For a distance of nine miles from J Parnassus to a point about a mil© beyond the Conway on ''Ferniehurst" the survey has been oompleted and the surveyors are now to be found a mile and a half beyond that point picking thei way towards the more difficult country in the Hundalee. Over the first part of this nine miles the railway track has been laid, the area fencud, and concrete culverts put in; over the second part the cuttings through which it is hoped the iNortuern express will one clay pass are being constructed. As yet there are uo rails laid oeyund Parnassus. From Wharanui rails have already been laid permanently tor five miles through the sand dunes while, along the next stretch, to the Kekerangu stream, the track has been laid ready for them. Preparation of the track is proceeding tor anotner five miles to the Bhades stream, following the sea all the time, and preparation will also soon bogin on the final twelve miles between the stream and the Clarence river. One of the biqgest engineering works in the programme of construction will be the building of the Clarence Bridge. Thus, the survey of the line is complete from Wharanui, the present railhead, to the Clarence river —a distanco of about twenty miles. Beyond that a certain amount of surveying has also been done. Camp at Parnassus. Laying tho rails is only the crowning achievement of railway construction, for arduous and often long is the preparation before this stage is reached. The visitor to Parnassus, who sees the symmetrical rows of hutß a hundred yards from the station, will know at once that he has como upon a Public Works construction camp. Except for food supply such n camp must be selfcontaining. At one end will be found tho office and engineers' headquarters; then there is the camp store and the huts for the professional staff. As one proceeds past the orderly timber stacks and piles of material, which has been amassed during the five months of the camp's existence, a blacksmith's forge in full blast is found on the one side, and a mechanic's shop on the other. At tho other end are the living quarters for the men. Carpenters are busy building comfortable huts which, by degrees, will replace the boarded tents. They are 10ft x Bft x Bft, and lined inside; each has its own.coal stove and bed. With a hut to each man and no ront to pay, the workers will be more snug and comfortable than are many dwellers in thickly-populated cities. Men Satisfied. As yet the men cook for themselves, but a cookhouse, bath-house, and mess quarters are to be erected. The boarded tents which, in time, will be replaced by huts, look quite comfortable. Jl reporter who enquired of several of tho workmen about their living conditions found they had no complaints whatever. However well the eamp was organised there would always be a few disgruntled ones they said. Such a camp is a necessary preliminary to building a railway, and the one at Parnassus certainly looks as if it is built to last. Preparing the Track. Now for the railway. Stretching away in a northerly direction from the camp, and on the eastern side of the main road to Kaikoura, can be seen the built-up track running straight for several chains and cutting a paddock of growing wheat in half. This is typical of the change that 1b proceeding in the landscape. Over practically the whole of the surveyed route on the Parnassus side the line runs through private property. Sixty chains from Parnassus the route passes across the Leader river by a bridge which has yet to be built. It is expected to cause no trouble. Then the line enters the Downs. Here it goes through a plantation and a passage has been cleared; further along it crosses small streams and concrete culverts have had to be built. A little over two miles along the route a cutting fifty-one feet high is -being made through the clay hill. Sixty thousand cubic yards of earth have to be removed from here, mostly by a steam shovel. Steam Shovel at Work. A mile or so further on a steam shovel can be seen biting its sharp steel jaws into a Bixty-foot cliff. When its mouth is full it empties it into waiting trucks. These are drawn along a temporary length of line by a "loco," and the spoil is used to bank up the lower levels of the track. The arrival of the "loco"—an engine woighing several tons —at its destination across a ravine and up a steep'hill was itself an event. Five tractors did the job. The shovel holds the record for New Zealand for its size for, in Tauranga, it shifted nine hundred and sixteen cubic yards of earth in one day. Wherever possible, in railway construction, the spoil from the cuttings is used to build up the lower-lying parts along the route. Sometimes, however, it pays better to take spoil nearer these parts rather than go to the ctittings for it. It is only one of the many problems that the engineer, soking always efficiency, must decide for himself on the spot. Some three and a half mileß from Parnassus the line crosses the main Christchurch-Kaikoura road by an overhead bridge yet to be erected. Good progress is being made with further cuttings in this neighbourhood, and the Department is doing this work by hand labour, in an endeavour to employ as many men as it reasonably can, though it is realised that the steam shovel is generally both quicker and more satisfactory. A Tunnel. After the lino crosses the road it will pierce a hill by means of a tunnel twenty-seven chains long, which will be the first one on the Main Trunk line north of Christchurch. It is not expected that this will prove a hard task, for it will be soft boring through a mixture of. compacted clay and gravel. The tunnel will be so constructed as to

allow of a running speed for trains of 40 miles an hour

A mile and h half further on the Conway siding and station yard are reached, and there, half a mile away, is the Conway itself waiting for a railway bridge to span it. This will be the* biggest bridge-building job along this section. What the engineers term the "Hawkswood section" ends on the southern bank of the river, and tho Conway section begins. The "Advance Guard." Once across the river tho lino proceeds through easy country—"Ferniehurst" —for about a mile and a half, when tho end of the portion for which the survey is completed is reached. Hero the "advance guard" have pitched their tents, and are busy digging out the track. Beyond are the surveyors themselves. Over these nine miles along which construction at various points is proceeding, tho three principal engineer ii\g works will bo tho of the bridges across tho Leader and the Conway and boring the tunnel. The plans for tho two bridges have not yet been prepared. No part of this route, however, presents any serious engineering difficulty, but the surveyors are approaching the Hundalee, where the hills become higher and the valleys deeper, so it/is expected that the construction work will become harder. Mr E. A. Gibson is the engineer in charge of the construction from the Parnassus end. At Wharanui. From the Wharanui end. however, tho problem of construction is differ* ent and in some of its aspects more difficult. The line is being built on Crown land close to the seashore, but in place of troubles with tho landholders, there is the trouble with the land itself, because its sandy nature and tho wind will not allow it to consolidate. Marram grass is being planted extensively all along the routo, and this does much to stop the shifting sand. The track itself, however, is being built up solid enough to ba proof against both wind and waves, though there is a stretch of about a mile unprotected from the sea. A Big Slip. The engineers on the Parnassus end of the railway have > been confronted with nothing like the "Blue Slip," about five miles from Wharanui station. Tho whole hillside has slipped across tho line of the railway for a quarter of a mile. Two steam shovels are engaged in attacking it bravely, but even when the debris is cleared—and this iB a big job—it is not certain the foundations balow will be suffiJ ciently solid to hold a railway. Th«

spoil has a large content of limestone, and this, when spread along the track helps to consolidate it; but,-so far, the engineers have found no other good purpose served by the "Blue Slip." Bridging the Clarence. The construction work has skipped this quarter of a mile, and the ensuing three miles to Kekerangu are almost ready for the rails. The Kekerangu will be crossed by a bridge 275 feet long and twenty feet high, consisting of five fifty-foot plate-girder spans on mass concrete piers. The work is to be proceeded with this week. Across the Kekerangu there are five miles of track through grass country to the Shades stream." On the last ' twelve miles to the Clarence the construction consists mainly of building up a track about four feet higher than tho surrounding country. , Once here there domes the problem: the Clarence must be spanned. This will be one of the biggest engineering works in the whole programme. The first thing is to discover whether cylinder piers or concrete piles are to be used for the foundations. In an attempt to do so three test piles are being driven in the bed of the Clarence nearer the sea than the new traffic bridge. On the success'of .these will depend whether concrete piles or cylinders are used. Piles are cheaper, ahd take only half the time, to sink.

Across the Clarence, in the direction of Kaikoura, the surveyors have been at work, but the details of the route beyond the river are not complete. Already stored at Wharanui is sufficient equipment to lay the permanent way as far as the Clarence —a distance of about twenty miles. The materia) for laying tho permanent way on the Parnassus section has not yet arrived.