HARBOUR BRIDGE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 499, 31 October 1928, Page 15

HARBOUR BRIDGE

CONTROVERSIES IN OTHER CITIES EFFECT ON SHIPPING In view of the great public interest being shown in the proposal to build a harbour bridge in Auckland, it is interesting to note that Auckland is not the only city in the throes of a bridge controversy. Sojne interesting information on the question as it affects cities in other parts of the world was supplied to The Sun to-day by a correspondent who signs himself "8.H.”

He states that in San Francisco it is proposed to build a bridge running from the San Francisco waterfront to the city of Oakland. This scheme has met with violent opposition from the shipping interests, and in the October number of the "Pacific Marine Review” an article gives a resume of the problem by Lochiel M. King, construction engineer to the Oakland Estuary Subway, and for many years engineer with the San Francisco Board of State Harbour Commissioners.

It is stated that port authorities always consider bridge piers as obstructions to navigation, and detrimental to merchant shipping. As long ago at 1895, at Glasgow, when the demands of traffic became acute, and authorities refused a permit for the construction of a bridge, triple tubes were built under the Clyde for vehicular and pedestrian traffic. At Hamburg, the port authorities refused to permit a bridge across the Elbe that might increase the hazards to shipping, and instead constructed twin tubes for vehicles. At London, no bridge has been permitted across the Thames below the Tower Bridge, which is at the head of deep-sea navigation. In 1897, to facilitate traffic, the Blackwall tube was constructed, and it proved so successful that in 1905 another tube, the Rotherhithe, was constructed under the Thames. This tube was 30 feet in diameter, and f,BBO feet in length. Both of these tubes have been in successful operation ever since, and accommodate all manenr of traffic, including automobiles, steam lorries, and horse-drawn vehicles. .

Similarly in New York no bridge has been allowed across the main harbour. Bridges have been built across •tho East River, but the Hudson River is the main harbour, and when a crossing became imperative to care for the enormous vehicular traffic, twin tubes 9,250 feet in length were built. A bridge is now being built across the Hudson, but at a point six miles up the river, and even here the bridge spans from shore to shore without any piers in the channel, being a single span of 3,500 feet in length, with a vertical clearance of no less than 207 feet at high water.

At Liverpool, where it has been desired for years to have a crossing betw r een Liverpool and Birkenhead, the port authorities and the Admiralty have consistently refused a permit for a* bridge. At Boston a bridge across the channel between Boston and East Boston has been agitated for for years, but has met with the consistent opposition of the shipping interests and the War and Navy Departments of the United States, and this in spite of the fact that more than 2,500,000 vehicles a year are carried across the harbour by ferries.

At Philadelphia they did construct the longest suspension bridge in the world across the upper part of their harbour. The span over the channel is 1,750 feet wide. year there were seven vesesls that could not pass under the bridge, and had to unload upon lighters to get their cargo to its destination. Realising their mistake, the proposed second bridge, across the Delaware has been abandoned, and plans are now being prepared for a vehicular tube.

“In the face of this, it seems to me that, before proceeding with the scheme to build a bridge across the Auckland harbour, it would be as well if our authorities, as well as the sponsors of the bridge, inquired much more deeply into this matter than they appear to have done, always having regard to the future commerce of the city, and looking forward and seeing what may be neded to protect navigation in view of the future development of this country.” concludes the correspondent. aVeosa2oltu,