Updates on the work occurring in Esk Street are being provided by the Council and Fulton Hogan.

What’s been happening:

• The north side footpath was fully paved with the new paving block layout on Friday, 15 May.
• The installation of planting area fences ( to support the plants as they grow and also to give a nice “green edge” to the seating areas) has started and wiill be completed next week.
• Piling for shelter foundations was started but unfortunately we found these clashed with services (water and sewer connections and a power cable in another). This has meant a while we find a solution. The north side foundations will be completed this week. This has not significantly changed the timeline but is frustrating.
• The stormwater repairs portion of the project to fix a number of collapsed pipes on the south side of Esk Street will be completed by Tuesday, 26 May.

Next week:

• The Parks team will plant and finish the garden area.
• The areas around the Esk Dee traffic signals will be tidied.
• Work will start on  the digging out and reshaping of the road so that the “pocket park “ area shape will be flatter than it is at the moment. The traffic has been diverted to the south side of the road so all the north side work cab be completed; traffic will then be diverted to use this area while working on the elevated gardens etc. This means we can keep the traffic flowing.
• The first of the walls for the park will be started.
• Powernet is replacing the underground transformer in Kelvin Street (outside the Kelvin Hotel). This is a significant project for them and is important to help make the power supply secure for the Inner City. This requires cabling around the Kelvin-Esk intersection and a section on the south side of Esk Street footpath up to the Cambridge Arcade. This is planned for next week to make sure it’s completed before the Pocket Park. This work (by Bond Contracts for Powernet) will continue in conjunction with Fulton Hogan’s work on the Pocket Park area but Esk Street will look busy with contractors working at both the Arcade and at Kelvin Street.