West Town Belt – Victoria St / Edgecumbe underpass
The West Town Belt Master Plan is now up for submissions on Hamilton City Council’s “Have your Say” page. For this post I thought I would look back to the 1988 Draft ‘Town Belt Management Plan’ with regard to the Edgecumbe Park concept plan, focusing on ‘Possible future pedestrian underpass combined with the Waitawhiriwhiri Stream pipe to link the W.T.B [West Town Belt] walkway with the river walk system’
Recent sandbagging shows the idea of building a wall and using the existing floor as a pedestrian underpass, with an access path extending under the footpath at the bridge, then looping round and connecting up to the existing river path.
The idea looks like a practical way of providing a safe crossing under Victoria Street. However, there could be a concern with the existing floor being at an elevation of about 12m above sea level, which means it will regularly close due to flooding. As a reference the Grantham Street boat ramp car park is 14m to 15m above sea level.
Option ‘B’ is to build a raised floor. The existing river path bridge is too close to ramp up to, so there is a need for a bridge realignment, or to move or even build a new second bridge.
The existing river path bridge is 2.7m wide, supported by 3 universal beams spanning 20m. Its hand rail tapers out to 3.2m at bike handlebar height[, and its centre line is 5.5m away from the Victoria Street retaining wall. With the river path (Te Awa river ride) becoming busier and busier in the near future, bridge widening may be a good idea here anyway.