PLENTY OF STONE AVAILABLE

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28766, 11 December 1958, Page 19

PLENTY OF STONE AVAILABLE

New Quarry Used For Facing Better stone for facing of' the big breakwater for the harbour extensions at Lyttelton was coming from the pew quarry above Gollan’s Bay, but the stone from the Officer’s Point quarry was better for Hard fill, the engineer-in-chief (Mr J. A. Cashin) informed the Lyttelton Harbour Board yesterday. The rebuilding of the No. 1 jetty showed that the board had tradesmen with skill to do the job, said Mr W. B. Laing. A second job done in record time was the construction of the road to the Gollan’s Bay quarry. Said Mr F. I. Sutton.

The chairman (Mr W. P. Glue) said he was surprised that the road was built so quickly.

A total of 562,000 yards of rock had been deposited on the breakwater so far. said Mr Glue. Some satisfactory stone remained in the old quarry, and when the new quarry was opened up plenty of “A” and “B” stone would be available.

On appearances, the stone in the new quarry was the better, said Mr Laing. It was hard, blue-stone. More earth-moving machines to carry the stone were needed. Stone suitable for facing and hard fill was now available, said Mr Cashin. The new quarry was a mile and a half away from the works, and that meant expense. “The bottleneck at the moment is dredging,” said Mr Cashin. “So far, we have continued singleshift working, but we might have to curtail the rate of dumping of stone in the water until the dredge Canterbury is back in the water again.” One or two more dump trucks might be needed soon, said Mr Cashin, but he was against having too much capital plant on the job.