Two-year Waterview tunnelling process begins

Eighteen months and 2.5 million work hours into its five-year construction programme, the huge Waterview Connection project is ready to start tunnelling.

To mark the start of the tunnelling an official send-off was held this morning for Alice – the project’s tunnel boring machine – with Transport Minister Gerry Brownlee doing the honours of switching on the huge cutter heads, which will excavate twin 2.4 km tunnels under Avondale and Waterview.

Sitting alongside Minister Brownlee in the cabin was 9-year-old Branden Hall, who won the competition to name ‘Alice.’  The boring machine’s cutter head has an outside diameter of 14.46 metres, making it the tenth largest tunnel boring machine in the world.

As it bores its way to Waterview and back over the next two years, it will remove 800,000 cubic metres of spoil and position 2404 tunnel lining rings, each comprising 10 pre-cast reinforced segments.

Mr Brownlee says the start of tunnelling is the most significant milestone yet for the Waterview Connection project, New Zealand’s largest and most challenging roading project.

“The start of tunnelling marks the completion of what has been complex works to prepare the boring machine for tunnelling.  Each of these work packages was a major project in itself, involving significant challenges and risks.”

One work package was the design, fabrication, delivery, re-assembly and commissioning of the tunnel boring machine.  Another was the design, construction and commissioning of a purpose-built pre-cast factory to manufacture the 4.8 km of tunnel lining.  The disused Wiri Quarry in South Auckland has been prepared to take the spoil excavated from the tunnel, in the process rehabilitating the land for future industrial use.

Mr Brownlee says the project’s success in being ready to bore on the exact date set 18 months ago puts the Waterview Project on the right path for the successful completion of the Waterview Connection in early 2017. 

“This section of new motorway will link the southwestern and northwestern motorways, completing the long awaited Western Ring Route.

“It represents a significant investment by the Government in providing the strategic motorway system Auckland needs to support its population and economic growth.”

Completing the Western Ring Route has been prioritised as a Road of National Significance because of the contribution it will make to New Zealand’s future prosperity. 

The Waterview Connection is being delivered by the Well-Connected Alliance comprising the NZ Transport Agency, Fletcher Construction, McConnell Dowell Constructors, Beca Infrastructure, Tonkin & Taylor, Parsons Brinkerhoff and Obayashi Corporation.  Sub-alliance partners are Spanish tunnel controls specialists SICE NZ Ltd (Sociedad Ibérica de Construcciones Eléctricas) and New Zealand pre-cast concrete suppliers Wilson Tunnelling.

For more information on the project visit: www.nzta.govt.nz/projects/waterviewconnection