UP-TO-DATE DEVONPORT

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 399, 6 July 1928, Page 1

UP-TO-DATE DEVONPORT

OPENING OF NEW FERRY WHARF BIG ASSET FOR NORTH SHORE REJOICING will be combined with ceremonial functions when Devonport assembles at 3 p.m. to-morrow afternoon to witness the opening of the new ferry wharf, which cost about £.66,000, and is one of the most up-to-date structures of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere.

It is fitting that the acting-chairman of the Harbour Board, Mr. M. 11. Wynyard, will declare the wharf open. Mr. Wynyard is a grandson of General R. H. Wynward, who, as acting-Gcvernor of New Zealand, and Superintendent of the Auckland Province, signed the first contract to bind the province to pay subsidy for the running of an open sailing boat ferry from Auckland to three points on the North Shore. These were to Stokes Point or Northcote, Barry’s Point in Shoal Bay, and the Sandspit at the Flagstaff, now Devonport.

The arrangement, after a year’s trial, was adversely criticised by a public meeting at Devonport, over which Mr. Alex Alison, father of the Hon. E. W. Alison, presided. The meeting asked for three separate services, and the demand was granted. The Hon. E. W. Alison will be one of the speakers at to-morrow’s function as chairman of directors of the Devonport Ferry Company. Mr. E. Aldridge, Mayor of Devonport, will be the other. WORK WELL DONE

It is doubtful whether any work in New Zealand of similar size, and situated as Devonport Wharf is, has been executed so quickly and with so little friction between controlling- staff and employees. The first pile was driven on March 23, 1927; the inner portion of the old Victoria Wharf having been demolished. Concreting of the decking was started on April 24, 1927, and the new vehicular landing was brought into use on February 20, 1928.

The passenger wharf is to be commissioned to-morrow. In the 16 months 6.410 square yards of concrete decking have been laid, of which 3,005 yards was for the vehicular wharf. Of the 2,805 square yards of decking on the passenger wharf 2,277 are protected from the weather by a lofty shelter ."iOft. wide on the arm of the wharf nearest the shore, and 45ft. on the cross tee. The passenger wharf is 50ft. wide and the cargo wharf 45ft. The decking rests on 218 ferro-concrete piles, the manufacture of which absorbed 3,200 cubic yards of concrete, reinforced with 382 tons of steel. The fender piling protection used up 300 hardwood tre-^s.

The structure extends 470 ft. into the sea and on the cargo section there is berthage of 365 lineal feet for scows and smaller vessels that trade to and from Devonport. One berth for vehicular boats is provided inside the cargo wharf and is equipped with a steel bridge 110 ft. long, weighing 70 tons, the outer end of which is held at a fixed distance above tide level by the use of an automatically controlled electrical winch operated by the rise and fall of the tide. It has given unqualified satisfaction and is of a type specially designed, -ftnd unique in harbour work. The engineering staff of the Harbour Board has achieved fame in its handling if the vehicular traffic.

A similar type landing is now being constructed on the south side of the harbour, east of the power station. The landing of passengers from the ferry boats will be radically different from the former method. There will be no need to caution travellers against quitting the vessels while in motion. The only possible ingress or egress for passengers will be by the gangway. Oft. 6in. wide and 19ft. long, which will be lifted and lowered by an electric winch operated from the ferry boat by means of control ropes. Two berths are arranged for passenger boats, with a reserve berth between them on an ob-liquely-angled sector of the wharf. A system of fender buffer-pilfeig will assist in the berthing of ferry boats. All the sea to the wharf have been dredged to 14ft. at low-water spring tides, and a channel has been cut through the bank that existed between the berth of the cable steamer Iris and the old wharf. The navigation will be materially improved by this. The night ferry service will be catered for with a timber Jetty in the angle of the passenger wharf and pleasure launches may use it also. FINE BUS AREA The embarking passengers will be separated from the disembarking ones by a substantial barricade extending the whole length of the shelter shed; ticket office accommodation and ticketchecking controls are provided. The cost of the wharf is about £, 65,000. To keep pace with the wharf improvement the Devonport Borough has widened the street frontage to 150 ft., between kerbs for a distance of 400 ft. forming what is claimed to be the largest bus manipulating area around Auckland; 50 buses may be park*»d ready for the passengers coming from the boats. The present demand is considerably less, but for the convenience i of the travelling public the buses will I be grouped according to their destinai lions. The incoming buses will disi charge alongside the wharf entrance, where an overhead cover has been built.