LAST STRIP

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26778, 22 May 1948, Page 6

LAST STRIP

TWELVE MILES SEALING PREPARATIONS RAILWAY OVERBRIDGE AT WAIPAHI The only section of the main south l'oad between Invercargill and Christchurch which has not yet been sealed is a strip nearly 12 miles long south of Wairuna. Work is now being done on this stretch of the road by the Public Works Department not only to prepare it for tar sealing, but also to realign it in the vicinity of Waipahi. Much of the work now in hand is not obvious to the motorist passing down the main road from Wairuna, although he still has to negotiate a metalled strip on both sides of the township. Road construction machinery is to be seen at points where curves are being straightened out and road depressions are being filled in. Some two miles before reaching Waipahi on the way to Invercargill, however, an unmetalled cutting alongside the main road draws attention to work •being done by the Public Works Department. This is a new deviation which will be incorporated in the main road in about a year. It stretches for about two miles past the township, and for most of its length it is not visible from the present main road. The new deviation is well on the way to completion as far as the formative stages are concerned. The work entails the building of a steel overbridge to cross the railway line just before it reaches Waipahi, going south. A large construction camp is situated just above the township, and workmen are at present engaged in removing a portion of the bank in front of the Waipahi School to widen the road. Steel has now arrived for the building of the railway overbridge, and as the Railways Department intends to improve the curve where the line will run under the bridge, this will have rather more than the usual span for a rigid frame type. The bridge will have retaining wing walls at either end, and the sealing of the road and the bridge are a first priority on the Public Works list.

Difficulty has been experienced by the department, however, in obtaining crushing machinery to provide material for metalling. The equipment is now in sight and this part of the work will shortly be carried out. The construction of the bridge, however, will take

some time, and the deviation cannot be used until this is done. When completed, the new road should not only be free from much of the flooding of the highway for which the Waipahi area has been notorious in the past, but will also eliminate many of the bends on this portion of the route. Further down the road on the way to Invercargill, heavy road construction machinery is engaged in filling a deep depression and straightening out what formerly was an awkward curve for motorists. This work is well in hand, and the Post and Telegraph Department is engaged in removing the telegraph poles to the side of what will be the new road.