CRL Connection July 2018

CRL Connection

3 July 2018

Excavation of Customs St

intersection starts in July

Tunnel excavation under the Customs Street intersection is expected to start this week.

This work will pave the way for construction of the City Rail Link (CRL) tunnel box section that will link the Albert Street trench with the tunnels being built under the Commercial Bay development.

Thanks to the concrete bridge deck constructed over the intersection about a year ago, traffic flow will be unaffected by the excavation occurring underneath. The spoil will be removed from the site using excavators and conveyors.

CRL contractor Connectus (the Downer-McConnell Dowell Joint Venture) will also be removing an old brick stormwater tunnel located under the intersection and replacing it with a temporary stormwater line that diverts water away from the location of the future CRL tunnels. The temporary line will be permanently diverted at a later date to connect with the Swanson Street line, created during the Albert Street stormwater realignment works last year.

Construction of the tunnel structure is expected to start in this area later this year and a full connection made between the two construction sites by autumn 2019.

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본 자료표에 관한 더 많은 정보를 원하시면 하단의 이메일 주소로 연락 주시기 바랍니다.

Arabic ‫ةرشنلا اذه مهف يف ةدعاسم ىلإ ةجاحب تنك اذإ‬، ‫هاندأ ينورتكلإلا ديربلا ناونع ربع انب لاصتالا ىجري‬.

Looking at the Customs St intersection from the Commercial Bay development

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Old piece of Auckland road construction to be saved but in a new position one metre to the east of where it is today.

Men’s public toilets are part of the wall at the Durham Street intersection. They were constructed underneath the road in 1880 but have been modified over time. There is little remaining of the original fabric, apart from some painted screens between cubicles, but the distinctive metal door of the toilets will be preserved as a heritage feature.

Close monitoring is being carried out during CRL construction to ensure there are no negative effects on the wall.

The historic bluestone wall that sits in the path of CRL’s Albert Street tunnel construction will be painstakingly preserved.

Located along the eastern side of Albert Street, between Wyndham and Victoria Streets, the wall was completed in 1880, following the widening of Durham Street. The wall connects a split-level section of roadway – with Albert Street above and the Durham Street slip lane up to five metres below the level of the main road alignment. It’s the oldest piece of road construction in the central city made from local material.

The heritage status of the wall means it will need to be carefully deconstructed, stone by stone, and then reconstructed in exactly the same sequence

The bluestone wall was built by contractor Daniel Fallon. In an obituary published in the Auckland Star on 28 September 1920, Daniel Fallon is described as someone “who had much to with works in connection with the development of Auckland” and it was said that “it can be truthfully stated, he built for the future.” Those works included reclamation works in the Waitemata harbour, the area that is now Victoria Park and the construction of the railway from Mercer to Ngaruawahia and Ohaupo to Te Awamutu.

The CRL website has launched a special section on the wall and the artefacts that are being found underground in various locations during CRL construction.

Click here for more.

Albert Street tunnels taking shape The sixth section of CRL tunnel wall has been poured below Albert Street, meaning the first 132 metres of floor and 72 metres of the wall are now complete.

Contractor Connectus Joint Venture is also preparing the formwork for the first sections of tunnel roof and has completed 72% of the trench excavation as it moves towards the Customs Street intersection.

Click here to watch drone footage of the Albert St trench construction works.

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Bracing works begin ahead of trench excavation Works are underway to place concrete capping beams on the 70 secant piles constructed in Lower Queen Street.

The 14-metre-deep piles will provide ground support for the trench that will allow construction of the underground rail tunnels running between Britomart Station and the Commercial Bay development site.

Once the capping beams are in place, struts will be installed between them to brace the trench and stabilise the secant piles during excavation of the new tunnels.

Inside Britomart Station’s Chief Post Office (CPO) building, the weight of the building has now been transferred onto eight steel underpinning frames and removal of the temporary CPO floor (built last year as a temporary working platform) has commenced.

Bulk tunnel excavation works are programmed to commence by the end of this month – an exciting next step in the construction of the CRL at the Britomart end of the project.

Click here for more construction updates.

Placing pile caps on the new secant piles in Lower Queen St

Diversion of utility services at Nikau Street To aid construction at CRL’s Nikau Street site at Mt Eden, MBJV is diverting the water, gas and electrical services from the eastern side of the road to the western side.

Work has started on excavating the trench for the diverted utilities and this is expected to be completed in early July, when the current lane closure will move to the opposite side of the road.

Pedestrian and vehicle access will be maintained during these works and a temporary pedestrian crossing installed while this work is undertaken over the next couple of weeks.

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Shaft guide walls go in at Water Street site

Site works to prepare for the construction of shaft guide walls

At CRL’s Water Street site, construction is about to begin on the 17-metre-deep shaft required to launch the micro tunnel-boring machine (TBM) that will install the new Mt Eden stormwater line.

(MBJV) has selected equipment that minimises noise and vibration as much as possible, in this case a rig that bores the piles with a large auger rather than hammering steel piles into the ground.

The existing stormwater main sits lies in the way of the future CRL tunnels at Mt Eden, so a 400-metre section of the main must be diverted before the project’s main station and tunnels work can begin in the area.

‘Jeffie’, the micro TBM that will pipejack the replacement stormwater main, is making her way to Auckland from France. She is due to arrive in midJuly and start pipejacking in October.

A piling rig will start installing the shaft walls this month. Contractor March Bessac Joint Venture

Watch the latest CRL construction timelapse videos You can go beyond the cordons and see the latest time-lapse videos of our major construction sites downtown and inside the trench.

View online

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A second shaft will be created on the corner of Ruru and Nikau Streets, where Jeffie will complete her journey and be lifted out of the ground.

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New CEO for City Rail Link Dr Sean Sweeney started as City Rail Link Limited’s new CEO on Monday Dr Sweeney is an engineer with a PhD in construction economics from the University of Melbourne. After graduating in engineering from the University of Auckland, Dr Sweeney spent seven years working on the development of Te Papa in Wellington before heading overseas to work in the USA and Europe and then settling in Australia.

In Australia, he delivered a programme of major public infrastructure in Victoria and ran a top tier Australian construction firm. More recently he established and implemented a $2.5bn prison

construction programme for New South Wales.

On his appointment, City Rail Link Ltd board chair Sir Brian Roche said Dr Sweeney brought a wealth of relevant and current experience to the position, as well as a strong academic background. He said both of these put the CRL project in a great position as it heads towards the delivery of major contracts.

Dr Sweeney says he is pleased to return home to lead the delivery of New Zealand’s biggest infrastructure project.

“My experiences of living in Melbourne and Sydney have shown me how absolutely vital major transport infrastructure investment is”, says Dr Sweeney.

“And in a city experiencing enormous growth, this infrastructure investment is of vital importance to Auckland. It supports the ongoing economic development of the city and meets the evergrowing demand for public transport.”

Survey showed majority feel safe around CRL sites CRL received a good response to its safety survey in the last newsletter.

Overall, 88% of the respondents said they felt either safe or very safe when moving around CRL construction sites on Albert Street or at Britomart Station. Many positive comments were received, including that the project is “well thought out for the extreme safety of the public” and the work sites are “well maintained and managed”.

However, the area of most concern for pedestrians and motorists was the Albert Street pedestrian crossings at Wyndham and Swanson Streets.

Several respondents were worried about pedestrians ignoring the electronic walking signals and crossing the live traffic lane, as well as cars not stopping at traffic lights.

For cyclists, the main issue was the narrowness of the roadway through the construction sites.

Although CRL can’t change the width of the road, it will continue to ensure a low-speed environment and keep the road surface as cycle-friendly as possible.

While CRL cannot police vehicle or pedestrian movements, as a result of the survey it will be introducing additional barriers to prevent distracted pedestrians walking directly into the path of oncoming traffic.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond to the survey to provide CRL with useful feedback. If you wish to report any safety issues to CRL or its contractors, you can email us at info@cityraillink.govt.nz

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