6 Sep 2018

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Christchurch City Council is working to quickly identify a new site where Hornby’s planned community facilities can be built.

The Council will work with the Halswell-Hornby-Riccarton Community Board to identify sites for the library, customer services and recreation and sport centre.

“We’re not starting from scratch because we have a lot of information about potential sites from our previous site selection process. We’ll be taking another look at the pros and cons of each of those sites and also looking at whether there are some new sites that are worthy of investigation,’’ says Council Head of Recreation, Sports and Events Nigel Cox.

One of the sites the Council will be having another close look at is Kyle Park.

Mr Cox says some more investigation work is going to be done to determine whether Kyle Park, which is an old landfill site, could be suitable for construction of the new facilities.

That investigative work will involve drilling test bores and digging test pits so a better understanding can be gained of the geotechnical conditions.

The investigation work will move around the park and only occupy a small area of it at any one time. The work will begin next week and should be completed around Labour weekend. Analysis of the test results and what they mean will continue until Christmas.

“The contractor is aware of the park’s history as a landfill site and will be on the lookout for any traces of asbestos. They will wet down the area to minimise dust and take air samples if necessary. They’ll also be putting temporary fencing up around where they’re working to keep the public out.

“If any asbestos is found, all necessary precautions will be taken to ensure that it is safely contained and managed. If Kyle Park does end up being chosen as the site for the new facilities, the land will be remediated before construction begins,’’ Mr Cox says.

“At the same time as we’re doing geotechnical investigations at Kyle Park we’ll be getting technical reports on the other shortlisted sites so that we should be in a position to identify a new preferred site in early 2019.’’

Denton Park was identified last year as the preferred location for the new facilities but that location was subsequently ruled out.