Good afternoon everyone,

I hope everyone has had a great week, it’s been a short but productive week out on site, with some big changes coming next week. The parking on the south side of Albert Road will be permanently removed from Monday – and the footpath temporarily closed while we excavate, lay drainage and the relay the surface with bluestone pavers.

1. Station Roof Works

There is good news and bad news in regards to the station roof works, the good news is that we well ahead of schedule on the section of roof works in front of the Botanica, which means that residents who have had their cars displaced by the closed driveway will likely be able to get back in next Thursday evening. I’ll confirm this closer to the date next week. This tremendous progress is a double edged sword though, as it means that we’ll be in a position to start the works across Bowen Lane sooner than expected. At this point we’re going to close Bowen Lane at St Kilda Road on the same day, Thursday 4 May.  We’re expecting that this will be closed for a period of up to three months. The reason for this extended period is that in addition to the station roof completion works, we’ve also got gas, water and electricity connections in Bowen Lane that we need to finalise as part of this closure. I’ll keep everyone posted on the progress of these works. Those residents and businesses who access their property via Bowen Lane will need to enter and exit via Kings Way while these works are underway. (I’ll have the map updated for next week’s update)

2. Albert Road Reserve Station entrance

As I mentioned last week, we’re making some very good progress down to the base slab level of the Albert Road Reserve station entrance. Excavation and shotcreting will continue next week, along with the continued breakout of the temporary pile wall that featured in last weeks photo.

3. Conduit Connection – Anzac Tram Stop

This is the final update on the conduit connection for the Anzac Tram stop, as today CitiPower successfully connected the tram stop and traffic lights to mains power, the removal of the hoarding around the temporary generator itself has started and we’ll expect to see it removed off site Tuesday next week.

4. Albert Road North construction

The time is upon us to close both the parking (permanently) and the footpath (temporarily) on the southern side of Albert Road. From Sunday evening we’ll begin to take the parking in this area, before the footpath is closed on Monday and pedestrians are moved onto a temporary protected footpath on the road. We’ll establish pedestrian connection points into each building and business, this will take a day or so to manoeuvre and get into place.

We won’t waste any time though with the demolition works, starting on one half of the driveway at The Domain (1 Albert Road) and moving our way westward.  While we excavate the section in front of The Domain, we will have additional traffic controllers in place to control movement in and out of The Domain driveway – this is a short term arrangement while we get the site established and remove the initial rubble from site. It will mean a delay for the residents of The Domain coming in and out of the driveway, once we’ve created enough working space, we’ll widen up the entry and access in and out will no longer require any traffic controller assistance.

5. St Kilda Road median works – South

The removal of the generator at the southern end of site in front of Melbourne Grammar will allow us to continue the bike lane works through this section, later in the week we’ll likely do a run of asphalt to complete the separated bike lane through the section directly in front of Melbourne Grammar School.

6. St Kilda Road median works – North

The excavation of a trench for the drainage along this section will continue next week, not a great deal else to report in this section.

7. Station box construction

There is a hive of activity inside the station itself, with the installation of the architectural features and works underway to commission the rooms that are required to run the permanent power for the station. As the majority of our large equipment is inside the station, we’ve started planning to close up the final void in the station box. This is the void that sits on the eastern side of St Kilda Road next to the big white crane. Once this void is closed up, any materials will need to be delivered to site via our station entrances, which are progressively being connected to the main box.

8. Shrine Entrance

The Shrine entrance is one such location where we’ll have a permanent connection through to the station box. The temporary piles that separated this entrance to the concourse level are long gone, and the team are in the process of steel fixing for the base slab in the Shrine entrance.

9. Park Street to Albert Road

The temporary detour for residents of Domain Hill didn’t eventuate this week, but has only been shifted back slightly to Monday. As we said last week, this will meant that we’ll have a temporary pedestrian access detour to and from the stairs at the front of Domain Hill Apartments, access will be from the north as we excavate the footpath surface. Speaking to the team today, there we’ll need to close off access while we’re working on the small section of asphalt directly in front of the stairs – and it may be easier to take the elevator down to the car park and entering and exiting the building via the garage door while these works are underway.

As reported last week – we’ve had very little luck with the location of the structural roots for the trees along this strip. The removal of the three trees in front of the Hallmark will now take place Wednesday next week, as the structural roots run directly across the footpath and the advice from the arborists is that they cannot be retained.

In much better news the remaining trees in this section before the Domain Hill driveway will be retained. (Always good to finish on a positive note)

Have a great weekend

Thanks, Rob

As part of the Metro Tunnel project, they have installed a lap pool in front of us in St Kilda Rd – complete with Yarra River water and lane ropes.

I keep getting those flashbacks of that Clark and Dawe spoof about Olympics – I don’t think our pool is the standard 50m.

Good morning everyone – It appears that the weekly update didn’t go through yesterday afternoon.

Resending this morning.

Have a great weekend!

Thanks, Rob

Good afternoon all,

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter Holiday break, while its been a short week on site, we’ve made the most of it and implemented a few changes on site. Most notably the activation of the centre carriageway and the start of the work on the separated bike lanes between Park Street and Dorcas Street.

1. Station Roof Works

Kicking off this section update with a huge thanks to residents of the Botanica who access their driveway via St Kilda Road. We’ve had to relocate everyone’s cars from this garage while we embark on the next stage of excavation, d-wall demolition and station roof tie in works.

The team are off to a good start and next week we’ll see the excavator down to the tie-in point, the sucker trucks will move in for clean-up, while the excavator continues to work its way north in front of 390 St Kilda Road.  As I mentioned previously, the section we started a few weeks ago has proved a little tricky with the final steel tying in the corner, but we expect that by tomorrow we’ll have the first concrete poured into this tied-in section of the station roof, with waterproofing underway next week. The area is then backfilled, which is likely early the following week (or late next week if waterproofers get a good run)

2. Albert Road Reserve Station entrance

Excavation continues along at Albert Road Reserve Station entrance, not much else to report here, the team are progressively excavating down and coating the exposed piles with shotcrete ( a sprayed form of concrete) This will continue to be the main activity next week.

3. Conduit Connection – Anzac Tram Stop

We finally have something to report here, with the electricity provider giving us the all clear to connect in the power to the new tram stop on 26 April, this means the decommissioning of the generator in front of Melbourne Grammar.

4. Albert Road North Construction

Albert Road North will remain in drainage construction mode for a while as the team work their way up the site. Last week we demolished a small traffic island in front of Albert Road Clinic, this will provide us with a bit more room to move cars through while we have the Southern footpath under construction in May. Next week will be more drainage and preparatory works for the future road surface.

5. St Kilda Road median works – South (Nightworks –14 April)

As mentioned in last week’s update, we’ll be shifting traffic barriers between Barwise Street and Toorak Road overnight on the evening of the 14 April (tonight).

This traffic barrier shift will allow works to start on the inner lane – One change that will take effect is that you will no longer be able to turn right from St Kida Road into Kings Way until these works are complete later this year.

6. St Kilda Road median works – North

Last night the switch for city bound traffic came into effect, with traffic now using the centre carriageway and the service lane used for local traffic and bicycles only. It allows us to start construction on the separated bike lane through the section of St Kilda Road between Park Street and Dorcas Street. We’ll see some profiling of the roadway underway next week to prepare for the bike lane construction, the first activity is drainage installation that kicks off with some service investigation excavation with NDD trucks. 

7. Station box construction (Extended Concrete Pours)

While the works underground have largely been out of site and out of mind, this week there will be some minor activity on the surface as we complete final section of the second-stage concrete pour for the newly installed track slab and track through Anzac Station. These final pours will occur next week – and while we’ll aim to wrap up by 10pm, the team advise that it’s highly likely that some of these concrete pours will run overtime, but they expect all pours will be wrapped up on surface by midnight.

8. Shrine Entrance

Nothing new to report at the Shrine entrance, with steel fixing underway for the future base slab and internal walls.

9. Park Street to Albert Road

As I noted in last week’s update, after an arborists assessment of the root situation, one of the trees in the work area in front of the Hallmark will need to be removed (the smaller of the two). We expect this will happen next week. The other tree along the footpath will have NDD excavation carried out next week, I’ll advise everyone of the outcome once we know more. Otherwise, the installation of pavers in this area will be the main task for next week.

Thanks Rob

There is a live camera on the action

https://www.youtube.com/@GaryBuck

Camera 6 is the one on the driveway

Just another reminder that all cars MUST be out of the lower car park BEFORE 7am tomorrow.

Good afternoon everyone,

Welcome to this week’s update and the first for April. A skinny update this week, as there will be a lull in work on site while we head into the Easter Holidays.

There will be no work on site during the holiday period, which also leads into RDO’s on Tuesday 11^th April and Wednesday 12^th April. Crews will be back on deck on the Thursday 13^th of April.

1. Station Roof Works

Next week will see the start of works on the next section of the station roof to be tied into the walls – directly in front of the Botanica driveway. Following the closure of the driveway and the shifting of traffic barriers, crews will begin breaking out the surface with excavators and hammers, before excavation commences down to roof level. In the still open section, works will continue to steel-fix, concrete pour and backfill.

2. Albert Road Reserve Station entrance

This week saw the major concrete pour for the capping beams around the station entrance, while excavation has continued on in the southern section. No new works on site, with excavation continuing next week.

3. Conduit Connection – Anzac Tram Stop

As mentioned, we are just waiting for approval from the power provider before we can cut the power over to the tram stop. There will be a days work to connect the power to the tram stop, at this time the pedestrian lights to cross St Kilda Road to the tram stop will be out of action, but we’ll have traffic controllers in place to get people across safely while the connection works are underway. Still no firm date on this, we are chasing the provider for an answer – as soon as this happens, the temporary generator will be removed from in front of Melbourne Grammar School.

4. Albert Road North Construction

Not too much new to report from Albert Road North, the team are busy with the drainage installation, this remains the key focus. The April construction notice will be hitting letterboxes shortly (I’ve included the new-look map below)

We’d previously flagged that the removal of the parking on the Southern side of Albert Road will happen in April, we’re going to push this back to the 1 May 2023. Not a huge reprieve, but appreciate that everyone would like to hang onto the parking for as long as possible. Once we take the parking, we’ll be closing the pedestrian path and putting pedestrians on a temporary path where the current parking is. That will see excavators roll in and rip up the footpath, ready for new bluestone kerbing to be laid. We’ve gone through and mapped out the building entry points to ensure that access to buildings is maintained. It’s still a little ways off– but a reminder that it will be another big change within the area.

The U-turn at the bottom of Albert Street is also going to be closed in April, the team are going to hold off on this closure for as long as possible, as it facilitates access back up to St Kilda Road. It looks like this U-turn will close in late-April.

5. St Kilda Road median works – South (Nightworks – 13 and 14 April)

The base slab has now been poured for the second of the chiller plant structures (the southern structure) As I mentioned last week, the structural steel and precast work commences after Easter.

In an update to last week’s notification – It has been confirmed that we will be shifting traffic barriers between Barwise Street and Toorak Road overnight on the evening of the 13 and 14 April, but in some further good news on parking – the removal of the parking spaces along this section of St Kilda Road southbound has been pushed back until May.

This traffic barrier shift will allow works to start on the inner lane – One change that will take effect is that you will no longer be able to turn right from St Kida Road into Kings Way until these works are complete later this year.

6. St Kilda Road median works – North – (Nightworks – 13 and 14 April)

Last week we finally managed to get in and complete a tricky section of asphalting at the intersection of Park Street and St Kilda Road.

On the night of the 13^th and 14^th of April we’ll do the works to install new traffic barriers and line mark for the traffic shift into the central carriageway in both southbound and northbound directions. The big change will be the temporary removal of parking on the western side of St Kilda Road. Like the barrier shift in the southern end of site – this will require an overnight shut of St Kilda Road to execute the change.

7. Station box construction

Works are pushing along underground, you may have seen the announcement that we recently laid the very last section of track within the new twin tunnels – and exciting development which paves the way for train testing to commence later this year.

8. Shrine Entrance

The pouring of the blinding layer is underway for the Shrine Entrance and will continue into next week– the blinding layer is the preliminary layer of concrete that will form the working base for the steelfixing and base slab.

9. Park Street to Albert Road

The footpath diversion is now in place between Park Street and Albert Road and the crews have wasted no time pulling up the asphalt and laying new pavers. As I mentioned in our most recent updates, we’ll assess the viability of the trees adjacent to these works. The trees have been marked for removal in the approved plans – however we wanted to first pull up the asphalt and use non-destructive-digging (NDD) trucks to investigate whether we can in fact retain these trees. We’ve this week done the investigation on the tree closest to Park Street, and unfortunately there are structural roots very close to the surface and directly in the path of the excavation works. We’ve had arborists out to provide advice and have also called in City of Port Phillip arborists to review the findings – it appears that the tree will need to be removed. It will be replanted with a replacement tree in the same location as part of the works. The other tree along the footpath will have NDD excavation carried out next week, I’ll advise everyone of the outcome once we know more.

I hope everyone has a restful and enjoyable Easter break.

Good afternoon everyone,

Welcome to this week’s update, live from the current centre of the F1 universe. There is also plenty happening on site, albeit not moving quite as quickly as the machinery over at Albert Park.

As forecast in last weeks look-ahead, we did get a bit of weather this week, so it has dented progress a little.

1. Station Roof Works

Next week we’ll continue with the steel tying to connect the roof into the diaphragm walls – the corner section is proving a little trickier than first expected, so the concrete pour isn’t on the agenda for next week. The start of works for the section in front of Botanica is still locked in place for the 13 April.

2. Albert Road Reserve Station entrance

Wet weather has thwarted our plans to pour concrete this week – we’ll have trucks and pumps out to site on Monday to pour the capping beams. Meanwhile the excavation has moved along in between showers, we’re now roughly a quarter of the way through the main excavation of the entrance itself. Other than some freshly poured concrete, there won’t be any new scenery next week, with excavation ongoing.

3. Conduit Connection – Albert Road

We understand that almost all the conduit connections are in place and it is over to the energy provider to cut over the power to the tram stop. There will be a days work to connect the power to the tram stop, at this time the pedestrian lights to cross St Kilda Road to the tram stop will be out of action, but we’ll have traffic controllers in place to get people across safely while the connection works are underway. Just waiting for confirmation from the provider about when this can occur.

4. Albert Road North Construction

Similarly in Albert Road, it’s drainage works in the central island section, we’ve installed some of the culverts through here and backfilled. Next week we’ll continue with sections of drainage and also start underground electrical connections within the Albert Reserve section (up closer towards St Kilda Road)

5. St Kilda Road median works – South

The base slab has been poured for the first of the chiller plant structures (the northern structure) In what is a recurring theme across site, we should have some concrete trucks arriving late next week or early the following week to pour the concrete base for the second chiller plant structure. The structural steel and precast work commences in April.

The shifting of traffic barriers on the southbound lane of St Kilda Road between Bromby Street and Toorak Road will take place just after Easter. This will require mobile cranes on the road shifting barriers, so will need a short term closure of St Kilda Road southbound. We’ll do this overnight to minimise disruption to traffic. We’re targeting an evening on or just after the 13 April at this point, but I will confirm once we’ve got the relevant approvals in place.

Once again, a reminder that this will result in the permanent removal of the St Kilda Road parking, southbound between Bromby Street and Toorak Road.

6. St Kilda Road median works – North – Nightworks this evening

The biggest impact from the rain this week is that we couldn’t get the asphalt down at the intersection of Park Street and St Kilda Road last night. Tonight was contingency night for line-marking, but we’re going to get into this section tonight and finish this asphalting work that we couldn’t get done last night. Once again, kicking the works off once trams stop operating, which on Friday night is a smaller window between 1am and 5am.

We did however push on through the weather and re-open the left turn from St Kilda Road into Park Street on Thursday night – as well as reopening the pedestrian crossing. A welcome change for everyone, I’m sure.

We do now have some brand new asphalt in the centre carriageway of St Kilda Road between Park Street and Dorcas Street.  As I’ve mentioned previously, we’ll soon shift traffic into the central carriageway in both southbound and northbound directions and temporarily remove the parking on the western side of St Kilda Road. Like the barrier shift in the southern end of site – this will require an overnight shut of St Kilda Road to execute the change.

To minimise the number of closures and overnight works – we’re going to combine these two activities into one night of work. As mentioned above, we’re targeting an evening either on or just after the 13^th April.

7. Station box construction

It has been a while since I’ve included a photo of works from around site, so today I’ve included a snap from underground that shows the main stairs down to the platform level. The yellow drum lighting will feature across the stations, as will the architectural baffles, these orange baffles help to reduce the noise within the actual stations. You can also see the station escalators, this is one of two sets of escalators for the new station, works are currently underway to commission these escalators – as well as the escalators linking the tram stop to the concourse.

8. Shrine Entrance

The Shrine Entrance has now completed the excavation down to the base slab and we’ll start building back up with the base slab and internal walls. The team are pleased to see the end of the excavation and break back, as this was a very small and fiddly site that was a challenge to work within. The entrance build out will kick off next week, involving concreting a blinding layer before steel fixing for the base slab.

9. Park Street to Albert Road

If you walk between Park Street and Albert Road now, you’ll see that we’ve put in place the detour onto the separated bike lane which will act as a temporary footpath when we close the footpath in front of Hallmark. We should get in and start breaking out the footpath tomorrow.

Have a wonderful weekend

Thanks, Rob

Good afternoon everyone,

A short and sharp update this week focussing in on the areas where we’ll see some change in activity.

Next week we’re expecting a bit of weather – so there’s every chance it will put a dent in progress.

1. Station Roof Works

Last week’s update promised concrete this week, but that’s actually set for the back end of next week. I’d like to point the finger at the weather, but I’m afraid it was me misreading the program, specifically when the concrete was going in. It will be steel tying next week with the concreting at the end of the week.

2. Albert Road Reserve Station entrance

We got some, but not all concrete into the first section of the Station reserve roof this week. The main pour is going to kick off next week, subject to the weather. Outside this, its business as usual with excavation underway in the other areas.

3. Conduit Installation – Albert Road North

CitiPower are still working on the conduit connection. I haven’t had an update from them this week, I’ll have some more news next week.

4. Albert Road North Construction

More drainage and surface preparation work down at Albert Road. Nothing new to report from this end.

5. St Kilda Road median works – South

Chiller plant work and median surface preparation still underway as per last week.

6. St Kilda Road median works – North

Next week we’ll see quite a bit of action between Park Street and Dorcas Street – The asphalt pour for the section of road at the intersection of Park Street and St Kilda Road will happen on Thurscday night (actually starting around 1am on Friday morning – essentially when trams stop running and we can get into this area). The good news is that as part of these works we’ll also re-open the left turn from St Kilda Road into Park Street at the same time – as well as the pedestrian crossing.

The next night we’ll get some line marking done overnight, which should be a quiet exercise. We’re also looking at getting some yellow hatching line-marking over the tram tracks where the 58 Tram turns in and out of St Kilda Road to get in/out of Park Street.  Drivers are consistently getting stuck in the middle and queuing over this area, blocking trams and causing incessant dinging at all hours.

We’ve put in additional signage, but hopefully this new line-marking also helps the issue, as I know the dinging is annoying for the residents of Hallmark.  

We’ll likely get some asphalt into the new inner carriageway between Park Street and Dorcas Street  from Thursday onwards.  The final date for the switch of traffic into the inner carriageway is still being worked through, it will require an overnight intervention on St Kilda Road to get the traffic barriers into position, so just working this through with the relevant authorities. Earliest date would be the 3 April, but I will confirm next week. Once the switch happens, the parking will temporarily be removed between Park and Dorcas Streets.

7. Station box construction

Business as usual down underground.

8. Shrine Entrance

Business as usual for the Shrine Entrance

9. Park Street to Albert Road

The switch of pedestrians off the footpath and onto a temporary path has been held up.

As mentioned above, the good news is that the Park Street pedestrian crossing and left turn from St Kilda Road into Park Street will open on Friday next week.

The footpath closure is now likely to happen late next week and coincide with the Park Street left turn reopening

Have a wonderful weekend

Thanks, Rob