Milestone reached on Awatea Place pump station project

A new pump station with the capacity to receive wastewater from the whole of the Tāhunanui area is now a step closer to completion as contractors have completed the deep trenching work at Awatea Place.

Group Manager Infrastructure Alec Louverdis acknowledged the wet winter and recent periods of heavy rain had made the project particularly challenging. 

“We’ve had less than ideal weather for this work, but our contractor has managed to skillfully negotiate these tricky conditions and extra stormwater work so we’re ready to move to the next stage now. 

“I’d like to thank everyone living in the area for their patience, while this work took place.” 

Awatea Place will now reopen but will remain in an unsealed state until work in the area is fully completed. A new kerb and channel, footpath, and final sealing of the road will happen at the end of the project estimated to be early February 2023.  

Work will now move onto Parkers Road and contractors are assessing whether it will be possible to lay the pipe there without using sheet piling. 

“For this section the excavation is not as deep as the recent Awatea Place pipe work,” says Louverdis.  

“We will initially trial excavation methods that avoid sheet piling. If successful, much of the line will be installed with trench shields which will minimize vibration. However, sheet piling may be unavoidable depending on the ground conditions we find.” 

Traffic management will be in place on Parkers Road from 19 September, with the eastbound lane closing (see map). A detour route via Green and Roto Street will be in place for eastbound traffic during the closure. 

Once the work is completed the Awatea pump station will pump wastewater from the whole of the Tāhunanui area to the Airport Regional pump station. From there the wastewater goes to the Bell Island treatment plant. 

The new pump station will have two large storage tanks for maintenance and overflow management as well as an odour control system. 

With a construction budget of $11.2m, the Awatea Pumpstation project demonstrates Nelson City Council’s commitment to building and maintaining core infrastructure in our city, one of the Council’s priorities for the latest Long Term Plan.  

This project has been able to occur in part due to funding received from Central Government under the Three Waters Reform Programme. This funding was part of a Memorandum of Understanding entered into last year to provide immediate COVID stimulus to maintain and improve water networks infrastructure, and to support a partnership investigating the reform of local government water service delivery arrangement

Infrastructure projects were allocated $496m of funding in the 2021-31 Long Term Plan. 

For more information visit: https://shape.nelson.govt.nz/awatea-pump-station.