SIX MILES OF PILES SUPPORT NEW STATION

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 514, 17 November 1928, Page 13

SIX MILES OF PILES SUPPORT NEW STATION

FOURTH EDITION

DRIVING DIFFICULTIES more workers in new year By December all the piles for the new Auckland Railway Station will be in position, and the building itself will soon take definite shape. At present over 200 men are workink on the job. but before the -New Year another 200 or more will be required. and between 400 and 500 will be working at top speed to complete the building. Mr. T. G. Julian, managing director of J. T. Julian and Sons. Ltd., conuactora. stated yesterday that he is confident of having the work completed to schedule time, so that trains should be running in and out of the new station in 18 months’ time. Over six miles of piles have been driven for the foundations of the main station building. The new pile-driving machine, which was specially obtained by the contractors for the work, has been a great boon. A pile can be driven at the rate of CO blows a minute and under its quickly pounding weight the huge spikes of concrete rapidly disappear into the earth. Steel girders, which will form the framework of the new station, are ready to be placed in position as soon as the pile-driving is completed. The concreting will also begin then. TROUBLE WITH OBSTRUCTIONS The contractors have been unfortunate in striking numerous obstructions during the pile-driving operations. The skids of an old timber mill were among the first, and these had to be removed. Then followed trouble with an old sewer and several large pieces of concrete had been taken out. An old engine bed offered serious resistance because of the steel rails and girders lying across each other in a tangled mass. The girders were embedded in concrete and made a formidable obstruction, which took some time to remove. Among the pieces ot' steel which were dragged out from the old foundations of the engine shed was the steel deckbeam of a ship which must have traded with New Zealand in the very early days. An old wool dump made of bricks delayed the driving of some of the piles. The piles of old wharves were among other obstructions which were met with. However, these difficulties have now been overcome and the work is going ahead rapidly. “Anything and everything seems to have been dumped into the old reclamation here without any thought of future building,” said an official of Julian and Sons yesterday. “The foundations of buildings which were demolished years ago have also been left,” he said, “and we have had to find them as we worked.” The recent good weather has enabled the contractors to forge ahead, and the actual platforms and approaches to the station will soon be seen in their complete state. Motor-lorries carry loads of material through the subways which will later be used for the carriage of luggage and by passengers going from one platform to another. The passenger subways are complete except for the tiling. A start has been made with the roofing of the platforms. One is almost finished. SHAPING THE GRANITE Both retaining walls are also finished, except for the final touches, it will be impossible to complete them to Beach Road until after the system of lines on which the trains are now running has been removed. This cannot be done until the trains are ready to run on the new lines out across the waterfront. ,By that time the whole scheme will be almost complete. Under the direction of Hansford and Mills the granite which is to be used for the foundation and first floor of the new station has been turned into the required shapes by special machines. Tons of this granite have been brought from Coromandel. When shaped and cut it looks very fine. By next month most of what Is known as the “spade work” for the new station will have been finished. Although very little can be seen at present except masses of material and machines a great deal of the foundations and essentials are ready. By the New Year masses of masonry will rear their height above the solid floor on which men have been working for some months past.