Building a bridge in New Zealand

[timbatrader]

About seven years ago I built myself a house in a beautiful but remote site

Access has always been a problem. In summer I can ford the river to get in but the rest of the year I park half a mile away from the house and wade across the river in fishermans waders carrying in the grocerys etc. It is fast flowing water so once it is deeper than upper thigh high Im not game to cross anymore and the alternate access is a Quad bike trail about a mile long via a neighbors farm to a bridge down stream. So I need a bridge after three years of paper work back and forth I have finally got all the required environmental consent, easement over public land, and building permits, Construction has started one of the young lads on the job has hung his iPhone from a convenient tree and posted time lapse video of the construction on you tube

Mahy headstocks nck otara rd 4 - YouTube

Mahy nck jib up otara rd 1 - YouTube

Mahy drive piles nck otara rd 2 - YouTube

Mahy abutment nck otara rd 3 - YouTube

The crane doing the Pile driving is a great old machine a NCK Raiper over forty years old. Now driven by the son the guy who bought it brand new it has been in regular work all its life and after a bit of a major overhaul a couple of years ago looks good for another forty years

 

[RedNeckRacin]

wow, thats quite the project! What kind of loads are going to be crossing the bridge? What sort of span are we talking about here?

 

[dave1949]

Beautiful place and quite the bridge project. Thanks for sharing. The pile driver is a nifty machine.

 

[timbatrader]

overall length is 39 meters (128 feet) the longest single span 18 meters (about 60 feet)
to keep costs down weight limit on the bridge is 3500 kg

 

[Bob77064]

Nice, that bridge will make life a lot easier for you.

 

[creekbend]

Truly beautiful Country. Best wishes regarding your project.

 

[MarkV]

Hope you will give us updates as construction continues. How the heck did you get materials in to build the house?

MarkV

 

[Western]

Very nice place!! wont be long and you can use those waders for just fish'n:thumbsup:

 

[dave1949]

In that in the pic of your home, that is the north side with the windows, and the satellite dishes are aimed to the north? I would be disoriented for a good while "down under."

 

[EddieWalker]

Very Impressive!!!!! Are you on the North Island? I've been to Auckland and down to the hot springs when I was in the Marine Corps back in 1987 and really enjoyed it.

Eddie