Start City Tunnel Now!

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 34, 3 May 1927, Page 1

Start City Tunnel Now!

And Save a Lot of Money Spoil for Waterfront Road A new outlet railway tunnel unde r the city to the North is to be the next big Public Works enterprise by the State in Auckland. The project is estimated to cost £616,000, this sum to be spent in varying allocations annually for five years. Unless the new work is put in hand early there will be a great deal of confusion, with probable monetary loss in connection with forming the embankment for the waterfront road across Hobson Bay.

For the different works associated with the Westfield deviation railway, the new metropolitan station yards and the underground railway from Beach Road to Archliill, a mountain of spoil will be required. A great deal of it has already been obtained from Campbell Point and the Orakei cutthings, but much more will be wanted for the waterfront road. By all the laws of economical engineering, such spoil ought to be taken from the tunnel under Anzac Avenue. Moreover, it is admitted by engineers who foresee the position in the future, that the spoil from the tunnel, or at least a great portion of it, should be taken and dumped on the waterfront works before the fine new railway station is opened for service. If the work of constructing the tunnel be deferred for about two years the plight of the engineers concerned will be vexatious. They will have to find a place for dumping the tunnel spoil. It is estimated, indeed, that something like 200,000 cubic yards of excavation will be taken from the tunnel, which is to be a mile and a-half long and, at one point, 130 ft. below Karaugahape Road. That means a great pyramid of stuff. To-day, when so muen good work is being done on the 60-acre block set apart for the station and railway yards, the engineers are pressed to find the requisite material for making up embankments and terraces. Every ounce of the excavations from the tunnel could be used now for the work in hand. It seems obvious that the work of the tunnel should be put in hand as soon as possible so that double work could be done in one operation. If this is not done filthy trucks, loaded with tunnel spoil, will be running about the new

station yards for years to the annoyance and discomfort of the travelling public and the railway officials. And by that time It may be necessary to find a new dumpisg ground for the material. Common sense seems to dictate a change of policy on the part of the Government and its departmental advisers. Since it is clear that the spoil is needed now, why not make an early start on the tunnel and begin a work that is admitted to be essential and profitable? It cannot be argued that the Treasury is empty. In addition to a surplus of £587,000 last financial year, the Government is raising a loan of £6,000,000 on the London market. What to do witu me money? In view of the necessity for obtaining spoil for the Hobson Bay embankment it seems obvious that a portion of the £3,000,0uu of me loan, which is to be devoted to railway works, should be allocated to the first year’3 construction work on the tunnel under the city. If it were done now it would eliminate the unkind political party criticism tnat the Government means to hold up the tunnel work until the end of next year so as to make the beginning on it a very nice gift for the general elections. Perhaps the greatest argument In favour of an early start on the tunnel is the fact that such work would > far toward solving the problem of finding employment this year for the large number of unemployed workers In the Auckland Province. All things considered, and having due regard to railway engineering needs, it seems clear that the Government has a good opportunity to do the right thing at the right time, and obtain the fullest possible advantage from an expenditure of public money on essential developmental work.