Kia Ora

Our thoughts are with all those who have been affected by the Auckland Anniversary Weekend flooding and Cyclone Gabrielle.
 

New Zealand remains under a state of emergency. Auckland Emergency Management has issued detailed information about support available. Please continue to follow the advice provided.
 

You can read and watch here about the impacts of Cyclone Gabrielle and the Anniversary Weekend flooding on the CRL sites.
 

As always, please don’t hesitate to contact us via email at Karangahape@linkalliance.co.nz or call us on 0800 CRL TALK (275 8255) and press option 4 with any questions or concerns you have.
 

Ngā mihi,

The Karanga-a-Hape Station (Karangahape) team

Supporting the Karangahape community

The Link Alliance team at Karanga-a-Hape Station are always looking for ways to help the community and soften the impacts of construction.

Hear what some familiar faces from the area have to say about the positive impact initiatives undertaken by the team have had, such as First Thursdays and the Small Business Support Programme.

You also get the chance to see some of the beautiful art on the hoardings surrounding the site and learn the reasoning behind them.

Find out more about the team’s work at Karanga-a-Hape Station by watching the video above.

Auckland's 'party in the street' is back!

It’s time to put on your dancing shoes and head down to Cross Street for an action-packed musical line up.

Cross Street Music Festival returns this year to celebrate their 5^th Birthday on Saturday 11 March, 3pm - 12am.

Proudly sponsored by the Link Alliance, the festival takes over Cross Street with a stage, bar and food trucks, and this year they will be bringing in some of the stalls from Karangahape Night Market for some added fun and dress ups!

Head to the festival website to check out who’s performing and to lock in your tickets.

Works update - Mercury Lane

Almost daily changes can be seen at Mercury Lane as the steel superstructure continues to take shape. To the north of the structure, all three floors have now been poured, with TVS and access stairs to come.

The in-situ concrete walls for the ground floor have been cast, as can be seen in the image below, with walls in the northwest corner of the superstructure. Installation of pre-cast panels to the west of the superstructure has commenced and in the coming weeks the concrete panels will continue to be installed around the structure, which will be able to be seen from the surrounding roads.

Towards September the architectural cladding, denoting a constellation as part of the sky element, will be installed.

The station's infrastructure continues to grow upwards beneath Mercury Lane as the team progress with the ‘bottom up’ construction approach. The image below shows the formation of the fire intervention stairs (from B4 to B2), which will be for the use of emergency services in the event of an incident.

Meanwhile, the familiar theme of wall construction continues. The image below is looking north from the southern end of the northbound station platform, where the Mercury Lane station entrance connects to the platform tunnel. The team are currently constructing a collision wall, which also helps to form the exhaust for the over track and tunnel ventilation up through Mercury Lane superstructure. 

In an ongoing sign of progress, the temporary plunge columns (which provide support as we excavate the floors) continue to be removed, allowing the permanent concrete columns to take over.

The concrete filled steel columns are removed in sections using a wire cutter, following a careful process with several health and safety control points.

The images below show the process in action and a cross section of a plunge column. Each time a temporary column is removed, the team carry out deflection monitoring in the level above to ensure there has been no movement.

Local goods returning to the neighbourhood

We have new businesses moving into Beresford Square, but we also have a familiar face making a return.

Neighbourhood Goods, stay true to their name as they are a store that sells clothes, ceramics, hats, vinyl and other goods made by the people in our neighbourhood.

They also have a wide selection of kids vintage clothing nicely mixed in with some adult pieces too.

Their store, which is also online, is about supporting people with a passion for what they do and they personally know the people behind everything they stock in store.

You can find Neighbourhood Goods at Shop 9, 59 Pitt Street, Auckland Central (they’re physically on the Beresford Square side of the Building), Wednesday to Friday 10:30am-2:30pm, or you can check out their website.

Works update - Beresford Square

The removal of the temporary deck at Beresford Square is now complete. All 12 large precast concrete slabs have been lifted off the steel frame and removed from site. This week the removal of the steel frame will ongoing. 

The deck was originally built to allow trucks to drive through the site during excavation and its removal signifies the beginning of above ground works at Beresford Square. Both the steel frame and concrete blocks have been sold for reuse elsewhere.

Regular readers will be familiar with the news that the Beresford Square entrance will be home to the longest lift in New Zealand – 40-metres long! In February the crew started the construction of the slab for this escalator that goes from B2 all the way to the station platforms.

The image above left shows the view from platform level, where the escalator will land, with a view-to daylight at the top of the picture. On the right-hand side, taken two weeks later three levels up, you can see the formwork for the escalator slab.

Internal walls continue to go up quickly in the station box with the recent completion of the walls between B4 and B3, and a start to the walls between B3 and B2. The images above show how the formwork and reinforcing steel are arranged to make the walls.

Above: Two different styles of columns are currently under construction at Beresford Square. The picture on the left shows framing for an architectural ‘stadium column’ which is rounded at both ends and will be visible to commuters. The pictures on the right show standard, rectangular columns between L0 and B1, these columns will be back of house and not seen by commuters; they will provide support to the new section of L0, where the temporary deck has just been removed. 

Meet…Mostafa Elrefaey, Station Programmer

What does your job at the Link Alliance entail?
I’m the Karanga-a-Hape Station Programmer. I have a computer full of many inputs from design, construction, procurement, many issues, and problems.

My main role is to develop integrated time schedules to determine all the interface milestones, and the project completion date. I also update this programme fortnightly, and report the progress status, and any delay might occur, along with assessing all possible mitigation measures to mitigate these delay(s), and finally supporting the station team to finish the work on time.

Where did you grow up?
I grew up in Egypt, in a place in the middle of Cairo called Shoubra, almost 30 kilometres away from the great pyramids of Egypt.

Where were you working prior to this?
I was working in Doha, Qatar as a planning manager for QD-SBG construction company.

What do you do when you are not working?
Playing with my kids, reading, playing football, and catching up with friends.

Any fun facts about yourself you want to share?
During lockdown I decided to try baking and now I love it!

Works update - mined tunnels

Though our tunnels received a lot of water during the recent floods and Cyclone Gabrielle, there was thankfully minimal damage. However, some formwork did need reinstating following the extreme weather.  

Once this was done, the team were able to move forward with their concrete pours. In the below photo you can see a recent pour with the platform in the southbound tunnel curing.

Construction of the platform is well under way in the southbound tunnel, as seen below. 

At Adit 2 in the southbound tunnel, which leads into the Mercury Lane station box, a large pour has taken place for the B6 level of the station box. Between B6 and B7 there is room for ducting and services. 

Also as described in last month’s newsletter, Over Track Exhaust (OTE) works continue underground. The OTE slab in both platform tunnels is now complete as seen in the photo below. In the coming weeks both of the OTE slabs at the southern portals within the mined tunnels will be complete.

It’s time again for your monthly music and market fix

The dazzling array of music and stalls that surrounds Beresford Square each First Thursday is back on 2 March.

As usual music kicks off at 4.30pm at the Pocket Park stage with performances from DJ Amine, Goodspace, Frujupeak and Pohewa.

Events are also taking place along Karangahape throughout the evening, including the not to be missed Monster Valley flea market sale at 74 Karangahape Road, 4 – 8pm.

For a full list of the line up check out the Karangahape Business Association event page.

Wire Saw

A wire saw is a saw that uses a metal wire or cable for mechanical cutting of bulk solid material such as stone, wood, glass, ferrites, concrete, metals, crystals etc. A wire saw, in action below at Mercury Lane, is used by our station box teams to cut out the temporary plunge columns.