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Demolition of Mt Eden buildings commences tomorrow

City Rail Link tunnels work progress
Supplied Content
Auckland, October 20, 2019

Interior of Mount Eden Station (Picture from CRL Website)

The demolition of the first of 30 empty buildings at the City Rail Link Project’s Mt Eden site near the Mt Eden railway station starts tomorrow, Monday October 21, 2019.

“Demolition is a significant and visible development for the project, clearing a site that will essentially be ‘base camp’ for the substantial programme of construction to complete New Zealand’s biggest infrastructure project,” City Rail Link Limited Chief Executive Dr Sean Sweeney said.

The Mount Eden Station Concept Design (City Rail Link Website)

The cleared site will be used as a staging area for a Tunnel Boring Machine and other machinery, he said.

It will provide room for the construction of the southern portal of the twin rail tunnels, allow construction of a new Mt Eden Station and allow existing tracks to be moved around to connect the Western Line with the tunnels, Mr Sweeney said. 

 

He said that the buildings will be demolished in three stages.

They are located in Flower, Nikau,  Ruru, Shaddock and Ngahura Streets.  All are owned by City Rail Link Ltd. 

The Project began buying the first of the buildings to be demolished in 2012. The last was brought four years ago.

Interior of Mount Eden Station (Picture Supplied)

End of the Beginning

“In many ways, Monday (October 21, 2019) will mark the end of the Project’s beginning. When these buildings have gone, the way will be clear for us to get below ground, complete the tunnels, build two underground stations, redevelop Mt Eden Station and then handover a world class rail system an international City like Auckland deserves,” Dr Sweeney said.    

Demolition will start in Shaddock Street. The first phase of demolition is due to be completed next March.

The Link Alliance, which is delivering the stations and tunnels of the City Rail Link, is managing the demolition.

Deputy Alliance Project Director, Dale Burtenshaw, says measures are in place to reduce any impacts of demolition. 

Measures to reduce impact

To keep people safe, the demolition area has been isolated by hoardings or fencing (footpath widths may be reduced and some parking removed temporarily in some areas around the demolition site)  

An independent specialist will monitor noise and vibration limits to make sure that they remain inside approved limits

There will be some noise and vibration.  Most of the buildings, however, are low-rise with concrete block walls and either timber or steel framing and extensive vibration will be avoided. Excavators will be used for demolition 

A specialist company is helping remove asbestos found in some of the buildings.

Useful Contacts

Mr Burtenshaw encouraged people to contact the Link Alliance if they have questions or concerns about demolition. 

They can  phone the Link Alliance on 0800 CRLTALK (option 5 for Mt Eden) or email mteden@linkalliance.co.nz

From Mt Eden Station, the City Rail Link will run under the Newton ridge and central motorway junction before it reaches new underground stations at Karangahape Road and Mayoral Drive/Albert Street and the redeveloped Britomart Station in lower Queen Street. 

The project will be completed in 2024.  

For more information about the CRL project, please visit www.cityraillink.co.nz

Art Week brings out creative talent

Magical and creative talents of Auckland children and the role of Mana Whenua Iwi in award-winning station designs will be celebrated by the City Rail Link (CRL) project as part of its contribution to the City’s week-long Art Week.

The Art Week was held from October 12 to October 18, 2019.

Dr Sweeney said that the Programme was a great opportunity to showcase diverse and distinctive designs that merge the imaginations of Auckland’s youngest citizens with the traditions of kaitiaki (guardians) and their stories of Māori creation.

Biggest Art Project

Mana Whenua partnership with CRL Ltd showcased in what Dr Sweeney described as ‘Auckland’s biggest-ever art project,’ the design and construction of two underground stations and a re-vamp of the existing Mt Eden station.

All three stations will reflect and represent the historic and cultural ties Mana Whenua Iwi have with Tāmaki Makaurau.

Cultural Identity Award

Mana Whenua partnership with CRL Ltd was internationally acknowledged at the 2019 World Architecture Festival where the designs won the Festival’s Cultural Identity Award. 

“It’s a war cry for a point in time where we can share those deeper stories that you don’t get anywhere else in the country, let alone the world,”  Hero Potini, Kaitiaki for Ngāti Tamaoho on design work for the stations, said.

Paintings of Auckland Schools children displayed at Wolfe Street in Central Auckland (Picture Supplied)

Throughout Art Week, social media channels were used to highlight how those traditional stories have been woven into the station concept designs that impressed international critics.  

The involvement of City Rail included Year Six pupils whose paintings were transferred to ceramic tiles and used to decorate a wall at the underground station to be built in central Auckland.

Hundreds of the paintings that illustrate destinations where the children imagine a completed CRL will take them, were reprinted on to material draped around an open-air art gallery on a construction container in Wolfe Street, opposite the Stamford Plaza hotel at the lower end of Albert Street.

The children’s artwork were also displayed on City Rail Link’s walkway hoardings in lower Queen Street. 

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