25 September 2006

Arboretum landfill purchased for GDE

| johnboy
Join the conversation
8

Angels and ministers of grace preserve us, Steve Pratt has said something interesting.

You might remember that last week the Chief Minister triumphantly announced his extreme cleverness in taking excess soil from the accursed Gungahlin Drive Extension works and using it to build the redundant arboretum on which his heart is set.

Today Steve Pratt has released the results of his own digging with questions on notice.

“Through a Question on Notice (No. 1196) I submitted, I subsequently received advice from the Territory and Municipal Services Minister, John Hargreaves, that an extra 200,000 cubic metres of landfill was imported to the GDE project because initial advice from Government consultants “indicated there would be a shortfall for the project”. This cost the Government $440,000.

“It has now become apparent however that the fill was not actually needed, as an additional 170,000 cubic metres of existing soil now needs to be cut out and removed from the landscape to accommodate further construction of the road.

“This removal of existing landfill will cost the Government a total of $2.5 million – a heck of lot more to remove than the initial landfill cost to bring in.”

Join the conversation

8
All Comments
  • All Comments
  • Website Comments
LatestOldest

Mount Stanhope anyone?

Err….yuk, Thumper. No thanks.

maybe the engineer go their ‘Degree’ from the ANU ?

Yep the new 4X course at Mt Stromlo will definitely be at world cup standards with the additional soil generously donated by the ACT govt. With all the infrastructure being built at Mt Stromlo, they won’t have a free minute to run a rally though that part of the forest – with all the mountain biking (XC, DH, 4X, trials), walking, runnning, XC running, road cycling, and road criterion cycling, etc…

It wasn’t your mistake che, 2 cubic metres of soil IS a 1x1x1 and another 1x1x1. 2x2x2 is 8 cubic metres of soil.

Yes, but you’re not an engineer che. This is the kind of thing engineers are paid vast sums to work out during the planning bits of construction.

I can see their mistake and can say that I’ve made the same mistake for my vegie patch, I ordered 2 cubic meters of soil thinking it would be 1x1x1 and another 1x1x1 but 2x2x2 is much more – so I just extended the vegie patch and its only taken me 8 months to do – yay

Growling Ferret10:02 pm 25 Sep 06

Look, there were only 370,000 cubic metres out on their estimations. Only 370,000 ute loads. Its an easy mistake to make…

Big Al – you answered my question from the weekend – the new track at Stromlo is a mountain biking track? I reckon they should use it as a Rally of Canberra stage…..

…and about 75k cubic meters of that is being used to build a seriously good 4x course for mountain bikers out at Mt Stromlo – you’ve got to love Government screw-ups!

Daily Digest

Want the best Canberra news delivered daily? Every day we package the most popular Riotact stories and send them straight to your inbox. Sign-up now for trusted local news that will never be behind a paywall.

By submitting your email address you are agreeing to Region Group's terms and conditions and privacy policy.