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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Infrastructure
Gearing up for top prospects F
letcher Building’s Graham Darlow is optimistic about the New Zealand blue chip’s prospects in nailing a number of the major construction projects up for tender in coming months. Darlow, who is chief executive of Fletcher’s construction business, released a list of the company’s top prospects to the Herald (see adjoining table). Fletchers already has an order book worth more than $2 billion — in essence work that has been won but has yet to be built. “It’s a long time since Fletcher Construction had so much opportunity,” he says. “It’s a great industry to be in at the moment.” Top of Fletcher’s prospect list is the NZ International Convention Centre that SkyCity plans in Auckland. “We are really excited about this project because its the first really decent sized vertically constructed project
that’s been had in Auckland for a long time,” Darlow says. “I know that SkyCity are taking a little bit of time to make sure everything’s right before it goes to market. But they’re telling us before Christmas we’ll be in a process for that. “There's some international competition for that but we’ll be going pretty hard for it being locals.” SKyCity recently revealed it had dramatically increased the scope of its planned Auckland convention centre, announcing plans for a five star hotel and a 50 per cent increase in spending on the new project pushing the cost up from $402 million to more than $500 million. Next on Darlow’s list is the redevelopment of the Auckland Downtown Centre site owned by Precinct Properties. This includes a tunnel so that the city rail service can extend beyond Britomart. Then there is the Central City Rail
Graham Darlow
Link itself — a 3.5 km double track tunnel — extending from Britomart to the Mt Eden railway station. Says Darlow: “That’s a really good engineering project we’ll be chasing hard.” Other potential projects include the new Christchurch Hospital which
is attracting strong international competition and the PPP for the PuhoiWarkworth motorway which has to pass through “really tricky geology and geography and is a quite a tough job from an engineering sense.” Darlow believes the uplift for the sector is well within the NZ construction industry’s scope as it has been under capacity for a long time. “We’ve already had one recruiting trip to the UK in the early 2000s when we recruited some fantastic people who are still with us now — engineers, quantity surveyors and planners. “They’re very, very good and proven to be really valuable employees since they arrived 10 years ago. “We are anticipating the need to travel overseas again.” He notes that firms may need to team up with others — including international players — to build the mega-projects.
Alice’s adventures underground Anne Gibson
Alice, the world’s 10th largest tunnel boring machine, is due to finish half her journey next month. Steve Mutton, NZ Transport Agency’s acting highways manager, says the first tunnel will be finished soon so the massive machine can begin the second tunnel. “On her arrival at Waterview in September, Alice will be turned around over the following three months and re-launched on her southbound journey early next year, building the second (northbound) tunnel as she goes,” NZTA says. On August 4, John Burden, project manager for the Well-Connected Alliance, gave an update on progress of the tunnel boring machine. “The TBM is about 1500m or two-thirds of the way to Waterview and approximately 750 tunnel lining rings in place.” The agency says construction of the two tunnels will be finished at the end of next year, when they will be fitted out with the services needed to operate them. “These include ventilation fans, communication systems and fire protection. Sixteen cross passages — one every 150m — connecting the twin tunnels will also be built. The entire project, which includes the motorway connections either end of the tunnels, is due to be opened in early 2017.” The Waterview Connection completes Auckland’s Western Ring Route. The alternative to the SH1 Southern and
The machine called Alice in the Waterview Tunnel.
Northern Motorways will be 47km long between Albany and Manukau. The Western Ring Route will improve city and regional transport connections, and is identified by the Government as a Road of National Significance because of its importance to New Zealand’s economy. The Waterview Connection project
is being delivered by the WellConnected Alliance which includes the Transport Agency, Fletcher Construction, McConnell Dowell, Parsons Brinckerhoff, Beca Infrastructure, Tonkin & Taylor and Japanese construction company Obayashi Corporation. Suballiance partners are Auckland-based Wilson Tunnelling and the Spanish
tunnel controls specialists SICE. Herald readers asked if there were any plans to open at least the first tunnel once it was finished, rather than waiting for both. But they were told that as much as NZTA would like to be able to deliver some of the benefits of the Waterview Connection project early, it was not possible for a number of reasons, including that ramps and connections between the Northwestern and Southwestern motorways, and other improvements along the Northwestern Motorway, need to be completed as part of the huge job. Rory Bishop, construction manager of McConnell Dowell Constructors in the Well-Connected Alliance says speed underground depends on many different factors including the density of the ground being dug, sharpness of the teeth on the tunnel borer or whether equipment such as cables needed to be changed. McConnell Dowell has a $400 million share of the job and Gwyn Jones, McConnell Dowell’s Melbournebased tunnel and underground project manager, says Alice is fast compared to the far smaller tunnel-boring machines that built the new Singapore Downtown Line 2 MRT where he has worked. Progress on that A$3.6 billion, 16kmlong, 6.6m diameter train tunnel was around only 140m/month in extremely hard conditions but even in soft conditions, only 250m/month.
City Rail Link buy-up over half complete Auckland Transport has spent $55 million on 38 properties it has bought for its $2.4 billion City Rail Link, forging ahead to secure the route in the first phase of the ambitious scheme. Carol Greensmith, Auckland Transport’s City Rail Link communications manager, says that is more than 50 per cent of the total needed. “We’re ahead of schedule in terms of our purchases and bought a significant proportion of what’s needed in the Eden Terrace area. “Negotiations are going on for the Life Church,” she says of one of the biggest and most complex purchases for the property on Mt Eden Rd. No new land is needed around the Mt Eden Station. “We’re upgrading that within the same footprint so we don’t need to buy any more land there,” she said. In the first week of August, Greensmith gave an update of the purchases, saying three new property purchases had been settled in the past few weeks. By May, the council controlled
organisation had bought 35 of the 73 surface properties it then planned to buy, although an announcement was made on August 1 that the scheme had changed and no Newton underground station would be built so the number of properties to buy had been cut by six, down to 67. Mayor Len Brown says that change will reduce costs by 20 per cent, from $2.86 billion to $2.4 billion. “A significant part of that cost reduction is an Auckland Transport decision to redevelop the existing Mt Eden Station and connect it to the CRL rather than build a new underground station at Newton. “That design change will save more than $150 million, improve the reliability and journey time of train services, minimise construction disruption and reduce property purchase requirements. The other significant saving is a decision that additional electric trains will not be required as part of the core CRL project, saving more than $330 million.” As of June, Auckland Transport
had bought about $45 million of inner-city property on the designated CRL route. About 42 property owners were in “active negotiation” with Auckland Transport. The organisation is now also buying about 200 subterranean properties: because New Zealand property law stipulates property ownership goes all the way to the centre of the earth, purchases are necessary for the route to be secured and the project to go ahead. New Zealand law contrasts with that of some European countries where ownership extends only metres below ground. Greensmith says the lines will run under private properties and anywhere the tunnels would be dug below, purchases had to be made by Auckland Transport. But often only a portion of any one property might be needed. Valuers calculate the amount needed to secure these purchases, she says. “Acquisitions will be based on the compensation provisions of the Public Works Act,” says Auckland Trans-
port. “Compensation is based on before and after assessment. Compensation generally relates to the degree to which the subterranean purchase impacts on surface use.” Owners' reasonable valuation and legal costs will be reimbursed. The subterranean properties involve about 88 negotiations on about 200 titles or pieces of land. Greensmith says Auckland Transport might sell some of the properties it has bought but no longer needed as a result of the Newton station being removed from the plans. “The question is now if we’ve bought any we don’t need around Newton. We might dispose of one or two,” she said. Subterranean purchases were now due to start next year. CRL is now at design phase on its most northern or waterfront sections. “We went out for expressions of interest for a design tender for the Britomart area, out under lower Queen St, lower Albert St and Customs St. They close on August 6,” Greensmith said.
Fletcher projects Top projects – August 2014 ● Fletcher EQR. Total Value of Repairs $2.5 billion — Contract with the Earthquake Commission to manage the repair of 70,000 homes plus install heat pumps (17,000) and do emergency repairs (47,000). ● SCIRT Fletcher Share $500 million — Fletcher is a participant in the Alliance to repair the horizontal infrastructure in Christchurch along with McConnell Dowell, Downer, Fulton Hogan and City Care. The owner participants are Christchurch City Council, CERA and the NZTA. ● Wiri Prison PPP Fletcher Share $275 million — A design and construct project for the 850 bed Wiri Men’s Prison for the Secure Future Consortium who has a 25 year PPP contract with the Department of Corrections. ● MacKays to Peka Peka Fletcher Share $400 million — An Alliance contract with the NZTA to plan, consent, design and build a 23km long expressway in the Kapiti Coast with partners Beca and Higgins. ● South Pacific Games – PNG Fletcher Share $120 million — Construction of the aquatic centre and the main athletics stadium for the 2015 South Pacific Games. ● Waterview Tunnel Fletcher Share $430 million — ● A $1.3 billion Alliance contract with NZTA to build the Waterview Connection including a 2.5km long twin tube, 3 lane (13.9m diameter) tunnels. Partners include Beca, Tonkin & Taylor, Parson Brinkerhoff, Obayashi and McDonnell Dowell. ● Fonterra Head Office Fletcher Share $90 million — development with Goodman to design and build the new head office for Fonterra in Wynyard Quarter. ● Auckland University Science Block Fletcher Share $140 million — Demolition, upgrading and construction of the new science block for Auckland University. ● Rangiriri Bypass Fletcher Share $80 million — Contract with NZTA to design and construct the bypass of Rangiriri on the Waikato Expressway. ● Justice and Emergency Services Precinct $240 million — Construction of the first anchor project in Christchurch as part of the Canterbury Rebuild. Top prospects - August 2014 ● New Zealand International Convention Centre — Construction of 3500-seat convention centre in Auckland adjoining SkyCity. ● Downtown Development — Redevelopment of the Downtown Centre in Auckland by Precinct Properties. ● Central Rail Link — Construction of electrified, double-track rail tunnel underneath Auckland’s city centre running approximately 3.5km. ● Christchurch Hospital — Redevelopment of the Christchurch Hospital for the Canterbury District Health Board. ● Puhoi to Warkworth — Construction of a 18.5km four lane motorway between Puhoi and Warkworth for the NZTA. ● Huntly Bypass — Construction of a new 15.2km of four lane expressway between Rangiriri and Taupiri as part of the Waikato Expressway for the NZTA. ● Hamilton Bypass — Construction of 21.8km of four lane expressway between Ngaruawahia and Tamahere bypassing Hamilton for the NZTA. ● Mangere Treatment Plant Upgrade — Major upgrade of Watercare’s Mangere Sewerage Treatment Plant to increase capacity. ● Auckland Motorway Widening Projects — widening of several sections of the Auckland motorway network to relieve congestion for the NZTA.