HARBOR WORKS.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 October 1921, Page 4

HARBOR WORKS.

ENOUGH FUNDS TILL FEBRUARY. USE OF PARITUTU STONE EXTENDING THE BREAKWATER The work of harbor extension is proceeding steadily at the port of New Plymouth, but the progress of the scheme has been retarded by financial stringency. It is understood that the Harbor Board has sufficient mohey to continue work at the present rate till about the end of next February, and it is reported, that in the meantime efforts will be made to obtain more money. Tlie prospect of stopping operations, , which wUs hinted at recently, has i therefore disappeared. . A visit made to the harbor y by a Daily News reporter showed that about 31 men are employed in the Paritutu quarry and on the breakwater extension. A vast amount of stone of workable size is lying, in the quarry, having been brought down from the hillside by former blasts. This is being loaded in skips by cranes oh to trucks, which are drawn to the top of the railway incline by horses. Here the trucks are transferred to the cable, by which they are lowered to the breakwater level. The cable which is attached to the loaded truck still at the top of the incline, is carried back towards the quarry, over a large surge wheel, to which adequate braking appliances are fixed, and then down to the foot of the hill, where it is attached to the empty truck already at the bpttom. When the loaded truck is released it commences its decent, hauling the cable to which the empty truck is attached oVei* the surge wheel, Which acts as a pulley block, the two trucks passing each other on a loop half way up the incline. By the time the loaded truck' comes to fest at the foot of the hill the empty one is at the top ready to be reloaded. By this means no power except that of gravitation is required to lower the stone to the breakwater level and return the empty trucks to the quarry floor, where they are handled by horses. At the foot of the incline the loaded trucks arc taken by a locomotive, which hauls them out on the breakwater, where the skips are lifted by a crane from the trucks and tipped into the bins of the barge Thomas King moored alongside. When the Thomas King is loaded she steams out to sea, the doors of her bins are opened by power and the stone slides into the water on the line of the breakwater extension. By the present methods and with the appliances in use about 250 tons of stone are handled per day, but if finance allowed of additional machinery being purchased it . is estimated that the output could easily be increased to 600 tx>ns a day. At the present time progress is often severely hampered by rough weather, which preVents work on the breakwater, and when the quarry is in complete working order the men may sometimes be out of employment during rough weather if alternative work cannot be j found. With a view to preventing a stoppage the engineers propose to commence reoalamation work on the town side of the wharf, where rough seas cannot interfere. Before this can be done a line must be constructed connecting the quarry line with the scene of reclamation and crossing the main line at th© foot of the Wharf. For some time the board has been negotiating with the Railway Department tor permission to construct a diamond crossing of the main line, but the department has so far withheld permission, and thirt will become a serious impediment to the best despatch of the works.