Regrets Leaving South

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31448, 15 August 1967, Page 1

Regrets Leaving South

An Auckland bridge builder, Mr A. Rope, who has finished the twin bridges across the Waimakariri, will return north tomorrow after working for eight years in Canterbury. Since he began building the Ashley rail bridge in 1959, Mr Rope, his family and employees have become confirmed South Islanders. “We are all leaving Canterbury with many regrets,” he said yesterday. “But we hope to come back as soon as a few big jobs come up for tender again.” Mr Rope said the economic situation had upset his “happy

set-up” In the South Island. It was only because there was no work in sight that he was going back to what he called “the Auckland rat race.” A handful of his men will stay in Christchurch until the end of next month putting the finishing touches to the twin bridges which he built 20 months ahead of the contract time. The western bridge should be open to traffic by Labour week-end. “When we got the job we thought we would have It finished by about November so we will be about two months inside our own estimate,” he said. All that is left to be done is paint the guard rails and remove equipment The bridges were the biggest of five the company built

since it began work in the South Island. The others were the Hurunui, Waiau and Culverden bridges. The Culverden bridge was built for the Amur! County Council in six weeks—half the contract time. "Working conditions In Canterbury are much better for bridge builders than they are In the North Island," Mr Rope said. “The materials are readily available, the class of worker is superior, the weather is kinder and it is easier to move around the foundations.” The speed of construction was assisted by stock-piling pre-stressed, pre-cast bridge members on the site ready for hoisting into position. Pre-stressed members were used on the Waimakariri bridge and also on the

Hurunui and Waiau bridges. These bridge members were pre-cast at the Blenheim road plant of Certified Concrete, Christchurch, Ltd. More than 2700 tons of pre-stressed beams were pre-cast and carted to the site to build the Waimakariri bridge. “Now I have to go back to being a collar and tie man in Auckland and I’m going to hate it,” said Mr Rope. For the next 22 months he will supervise construction of new approaches to the Auckland Harbour bridge to link up with bridge-widening being done by a Japanese company. His company will build twin lanes running on to the northern end of the bridge at a cost of $1,555,528. The decks alone will contain 18,000 cubic yards of concrete.