LAST SHOTS

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 65, 10 December 1930, Page 13

LAST SHOTS

Mount Victoria Tunnel

LINING FINISHED

Two Months’ More Work

The last shots of concrete in the lining of the New Mount Victoria tunnei are being fired to-day from the machine which pumps it behind the mould, arid practically all that remains to be done is to remove the core, or central block, from which the overhead work has been done, effecting an immense saving of scaffolding. This will only take about a month, and the contract will be completed in about two months, or about four months within the time stated in the contract.

The contract price was approximately £135,000, and time is an important factor in carrying out sueh a contract with satisfactory financial results to the construction firm. When yesterday afternoon a visit of inspection was paid to the tunnel by the DeputyMayor, Councillor M. F. Luckie, to see some of the last shots of concrete fired about the middle of the tunnel, reference was made to the eificient and speedy manner in which the work bad been car: 1 out by the contractors, Hansford and Mills. The Concrete Gun. The tunnel is 2045 ft. long, and the lining will be complete in a few days, when the final section of concrete has hardened and the steel mould has been removed. The concrete of the tunnel .is two feet thick. It has been forced in by a gun, cement requiring only 24 hours to set being used. A raised footpath 6ft. wide and 6ft. above the road level has yet to be constructed. Two vertical air shafts have been constructed, but the amount of forced ventilation necessary has yet to be determined. First Councillor Through. The concreting proper was started in June, and progressed at the rate of 60ft. a week from each end. As soon as the final touch is put the concreting machinery will be removed from the tunnel, and the core will be loosened with explosives, A new electrical shovel has been obtained, and the work of removing the central block will go ahead with all speed, keeping the trucks as fast as they can. When the Deputy-Mayor visited the tunnel yesterday he was the first councillor to go right through, walking on the. top of the core, and negotiating the various planks across the cuttings which have been made through the central block. He was accompanied by Mr. Leonard Mills, of Hansford and Mills, and Mr. A. Downer, engineer in charge. Having seen the firing of shots of concrete in the last section, the party went through the tunnel to the Hataitai end, and motored back to the city entrance. Unusual Work. The Deputy-Mayor said he would like to congratulate Mr. Mills on behalf of the contractors on the work, which had been done so efficiently. ' No better expert could have undertaken the job, and it must be a source of intense satisfaction to the firm and to the city that it had been done so efficiently. It was the biggest sectional area of tunnelling in Australia or New Zealand, and had been done at a speed never equalled before, about one-third less time than any similar piece of work. The cutting out of the central block was a trifling matter. He hoped the success from the financial point of view would be as great as the satisfaction the carrying out of the work would be from a -civic point of view, and if that were so no one would grudge them one farthing.

Staff Co-operation. Mr. Mills thanked the Deputy-Mayor, and said the firm was pleased and satisfied with the contract. He would like to give to Mr. Downer, engineer in charge, the whole of the credit for the way he had organised the job. He did not think any man in New Zealand could have done it in the manner Mr. Downer had done it. He had controlled the body of men, and the work had been going on 24 hours a day for the last eleven months without a growl, all putting their best into it, and a great deal was due to the work of the assistant engineer. Mr. G. L. Mason, who had been in control of the survey, and was responsible for the accurate alignment of the tunnel. Had the two sections not met accurately there .would have been serious trouble.