THE BUILDING PROGRAMME.

Putaruru Press, Volume II, Issue 47, 11 September 1924, Page 2

THE BUILDING PROGRAMME.

TWO WORKERS’ VILLAGES.' One At The Dam Site. One Next Permanent Village. Building- work at Arapuni is proceeding apace, and the last fortnight’s activities are certainly impressive, though embracing only a small portion of the total buildingprogramme. Besides the permanent village, which is to comprise in all some 14 houses, single men’s quarters, school, and Public Works Department’s office, the contractors, Sir *W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth and Co., are establishing two temporary villages for the housing of their workmen for the duration of the contracts. The first of these is against the permanent village —on the Putaruru side—and is known as the Huihuitaha village, while the other is at the dam site, the two thus being over half-a-mile apart. At the Huihuitaha village are now virtually completed two big barracks, each with accommodation for 50 men, a cookhouse for 150 men, and two five-roomed cottages. Water supply pipes, bringing pumped from the Huihuitaha stream, are laid and electricity is being installed throughout the buildings. Some distance along towards the dam site and immediately across the road from the permanent village a set of offices for the contractors is being built. The framework is up, indicating that the building will be of bungalow type and similar to the Public Works Office in the permanent village. At the dam site village the framework is up for two 52-men barracks and a large cookhouse. In addition, the contractors' agent, Mr. F. W. A. Handman, has authorised the building sub-contractor, Mr. Robert Sanders, to also proceed with the following:— At the Huihuitaha village, four 4room huts, six 3-room huts, and four 2-room huts. At the dam site village, four 4-room huts, eight 3-room huts, and four 2-room huts; in the permanent village, house for the contractors' agent and four houses for the contractors’ engineers; miscellaneous, cement store at darn site, cement store at the contractors' private railway siding, Putaruru, and store shed at the dam site, all these stores being 60ft by 26ft. The big barracks are for the single men, and the huts for the married men. All the buildings mentioned, however, represent but a minor portion of the total building programme, but with close on 60 carpenters now on the job and another score or so due to arrive, Mr. Sanders expects to have accommodation for some 200 men completed in about another week’s time—his fifth week on the job—and the whole programme of building for 600 men finished in November. THE PERMANENT VILLAGE.

In the permanent village itself, so far there are only the four houses and set of offices previously erected by the Public Works Department, besides a small temporary Public Works barracks, but stacks of timber on the various sections indicate where the further ten houses and barracks are to be erected by Mr. Sanders for the contractors.

The framework for the Arapuni school, in the centre of the village, is up. This in an entirely^separate contract, let direct by the Education Board to a builder troiri Auckland. Near the Huihuitaha village two shops are nearing completion, this representing private enterprise. THE AERIAL ROPEWAY. Meanwhile, Mr. Handman and his engineers are progressing with the detail preliminary work for the various big engineering projects comprising the contracts. Mr. Handman states that the survey for the 12-mile aerial ropeway from Arapuni to the Muku Creek quarry will be started in a few days’ time. Questioned as to a suggestion that a suitable quarry might be obtained at Maungatautari, only four miles from Arapuni, he intimated that this suggestion had come to nothing. “ THE DIVERSION TUNNEL. He added that the di*iving of the diversion tunnel, which, like the construction of the ropeway, was one of the first works, would be started in a couple of months’ time, but it would not be until then that workmen, including tunnellers, miners, and labourers would be required.