BUILDER OF BRIDGES

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 21, 26 January 1931, Page 11

BUILDER OF BRIDGES

MR. LAWRENCE INNES'S WORK

SPANNING SYDNEY -HARBOUR

"I see ho reason why the public of Sydney should not have the use of the bridge before the end of the year," remarked. Mr. Lawrence Innes, director of construction of the Sydney harbour bri'flge, when discussing the bridge with a "Post" reporter to-day. Mr. Innes, whose home is in Yorkshire, has been resident in Sydney for the past six years supervising the construction of the Sydney bridge for Messrs. Dormati, Long, and Co., the contractors. He is at present on a short holiday to New Zealand, and leaves Wellington on Friday for Australia.

Mr. Innes said that it was expected that by the middle of next'month all the steel work on the bridge would be finished. That would leave to be completed the roadway surfacing, painting, and the tops of the pylons, which work should be finished by August. The contractors were well up to contract time. The limit was tho end of the year, but there was •an extension duo to the introduction of the 44-hour week in Australia. "I am satisfied with the structure," he said, "and know of no single defect in tho whole of it. It will undoubtedly be one of the world's outstanding bridges for many years to come."

During the peak period of the contract 1200 men were employed, but at the present time the number had been reduced to 800. By the end of February the number should be further reduced to 200. When he arrived in Sydney he brought eight staff members from -England to take charge of the contract. The entire bridge was built with Australian labour (which he found to be the equal of'labour in any other country in the world), with the exception of workers brought out £r.om Aberdeen, with the permission of the Government, to be engaged in quarrying the 20,000 tons of granite used in the building of the bridge. This was quarried at Moruya, New South Wales, whefo a settlement of nearly 100 houses was built for the workers, who brought their wives and children.

Mr. Innes said that he had no hesitation in stating,'as he had stated in Australia, that if piece-work, or payment by results, was permitted in Australia, there was no reason why Australia, should not export fabricated or finished steel to nearby countries.

The. company which employs him, Messrs. Donnan, Long, specialises in bridgo-building, and during the. last twenty-five years he had been engaged particularly'in India, Egypt, and Africa.

"Mrs. Inncs and myself travelled from Auckland by .motor-car," he said, "and -wo were particularly impressed with the beautiful country and" its fertility. While times may not be quite as good as they might be, my firm opinion is that there should be no poor— certainly no one hungry—in New Zealand. "People talk about bad times, but you look prosperous from one end of the country to the other. New Zealand is only suffering in sympathy with the rest of the world; the position is not due to anything that has happened in New Zealand."