HUTT TELEPHONES

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 90, 13 October 1931, Page 10

HUTT TELEPHONES

THE NEW EXCHANGE

BUILDING COMPLETED

Telephone subscribers in the Hutt Valley have long been looking forward to the modernising of the telephone system in that area by the installation of automatic mechanism. The date of the change has yet to ba announced, but evidence of its approach is supplied by the completion of the exchango building. It will be handed over by the contractors (the Hotelier Construction Company) to tho P. and T. Department to-morrow. It is situated at the corner of Knights road and Laings road, adjacent to tho courthouse, and is of handsome design. It is thought by. many people that a cornice is an essential feature of a handsome building, but the new oxchange provides striking evidence to tho contrary; though without cornice o:1 any other projecting ornamentation, it has a striking appearance which has won general commendation. It has tho additional virtue of being, as fat as ingenuity can make it, earthquake and fireproof. The building measures 55ft 6in by 61ft 6in measured inside, and ita two floors cover nearly a sixth of an acre. The height of the first story is 12ft 9in, and of the second 16ft. The construction is steel frame with curtain walls of reinforced concrete, and a pointed brick facing between concrete bands. Special care was taken with the foundations, which contain 221 cubic yards of concrete, the building resting on what is practically a. floating foundation. Tho concrete floor is 6 inches thick, heavily reinforced. The whole of the steel work was fabricated in Wellington, the steel roof principals being taken out complete and ready for hoisting into position. The walls contain 228 cubic yards of concrete- and 116,000 bricks. The ground floor contains seven rooms. On the left of tho entrance are a cloak-room which also contains the spiral staircase and the entrance to the subway tunnel through which the cables from the street will enter; a store room, lunch room, and a lavatory. On the opposite side of the hallway are' a battery room, to contain tho batteries which store the power for tho system; a power room, where the electieity will be converted for use in the batteries and where also tho electric pumps for conditioning the air will bo situated; and lastly an air conditioning room, where the atmosphero will be brought to the correct temperature and moisture content for the efficient running of the plant. The upper floor is one big room, and will contain the whole of the automatic switching apparatus, the distributiou board being in tho front of the building, where the cables emerge from the cloak room shaft into a runway along the front of tho building upstairs. The erection of the building, the contract price of which was £7600, has been carried out under the superintendence of Mr. J. H. Roberts. It was commenced on 7th January, but from 23rd February to 16th April the work was suspended awaiting the arrival of steel, and since then some two and a half weeks have been lost through wet weather. The work of reticulating tho district with ,the underground cables has been proceeding since before the building was started, and to-morrow the P. and T. engineers will begin installing the machinery and plant.