Join the Railway Technical Society of Australasia New Zealand Chapter online for a presentation on the design and construction of the KiwiRail Tar Barrel tunnel bypass, Main North Line by Rob Hunter, and Gilles Langlais at 12:30-1:30pm NZDT on Tuesday 5th October 2021.

Register here.

Deterioration of Tunnel 21 had been documented back to as early as the 1970’s, and following the 2016 Kaikoura and Seddon Earthquakes, suffered more damage.  With a low resilience to future earthquakes and general deterioration of the concrete lining, coupled with tight clearances, track subgrade and formation in poor condition, and a TSR of 15km/hr, a new rail alignment was proposed.  This presentation details how the project team managed to accelerate the design and tender process, provides an overview of construction and some of the key challenges that were faced, and summaries a few of the key lessons learned.

Speakers

Rob Hunter, Project Manager at Tonkin & Taylor

Rob is a Project Manager and Engineer for Tonkin & Taylor.  In mid-2018 he helped to establish the project team and assisted in the project, design and tender management through to mid-2019.  He then provided client-side project management throughout the construction phase alongside roles in monitoring, surveillance and quality assurance, and contract management.

Gilles Langlais, Project Manager at HEB Construction

Gilles is a Project Manager for HEB Construction. He joined the TBTB project in August 2019 as a Structures Project Engineer where he helped to deliver the new Ruakanakana underpass structure. In mid-2020, Gilles moved into a Project Manager role and helped with delivering the remainder of the road and rail works through to completion.

Click here register on the Engineering New Zealand website.