SYDNEY'S BRIDGE

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 86, 8 October 1921, Page 5

SYDNEY'S BRIDGE

TENDERS TO BE CALLED

THE SCHEME OUTLINED

(UNITBB PRBSS ASSOCIATION.—COI'XRIGHT.) ' (Received October 8, 10 a.m.) SYDNEY, This Day. The Government is calling for tenders for the North Sydney Bridge, to include tlie four lines of railways. The tenders close in October, 1932.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge from Dawes Point to Milson'e Point was built, in imagery, by Mr. J. J- <?• Bradfield, Chief Engineer for Metropolitan Railway Construction, for the edification of the Ad Men's Institute, at a gathering in Sydney Tecently. As the facts and figures regarding the much-talked-of Structure, were enumerated by him, one cottld see, as he apparently can (says the Daily Telegraph), the four, lines of railway; the highway, 35 feet wide; the motor roadway 17i feet; and the footwalk, which is calculated, on ite 15-feet width, to accommodate 10,000 pedestrians, if neoessary, at the one time. The bridge is estimated to cost £6,000,000, of which £4,ooo,ooo—the cost of providing four lines of railway, including the approaches from Bay-Toad Station and to Wynyard Square—is to be charged jigainst the Railway Commissioners, and the remainr ing £2,000,000 is to be defrayed by_ i tax imposed on the unimpiwed capital value of land in the City of Sydney and adjacent municipalities. Assuming the railway is opened on Ist January, 1931, the Chief Commissioner .estimates that interest on the £4,000,000, working expenses, and maintenance charges can be met, and there wyi be a surplus of £262,826 for the first year. The fare "would be threepence from the Point-to. Wynyard' Square, and the journey would save 12 minutes on the present travelling time. ; f .'As far as the municipal share of the expenditure is concerned, it is estimated that a tax of one halfpenny in the £ on! unimproved oapital values would yield yearly £114,933. Fifteen instalments would yield £2,566,395, liquidating al] .charges for the first five yeaTs ,after the completion of the bridge, and leaving a balance of £300,000, the interest on which would defray upkeep, mainten^ ance, and lighting for all time.

The bridge, whioh will be the. heaviest steel.work over made, is to be constmctr ed in spans, and the centre span, weighing 6000 tons, will have w> be jacked up into position from punts, a work which Mr.1 Bradfield estimates will take at least four days.

By its construction, the speaker saidl/ residents of the Northern Suburbs -will have oheaper and quicker transit. Vehicular and pedestrian traffic across it will be-free; property valuts ,oh the northern sidie will be materially increased, and as an instance of its efficacy Manly will he brought within 18 minutes of the city.