• Client: KiwiRail
• Year: 2012-2013

Service Engineers was appointed as a sub-contractor working with Fulton Hogan John Holland joint venture to upgrade Auckland city's rail network. The NZD$600 million upgrade allows for improved services and increased capacity across Auckland's rail system. A main feature of this upgrade is the installation of a new electrification system to facilitate the use of new electric trains across the network. The electrification system is a 25KV AC simple return conductor system running almost 80km from Papakura in the South through central Auckland and finishing out West in Swanson.

The electrification works have been completed by a specialist rail electrification contractor and Service Engineers was contracted to work on the installation of safety screens along bridges spanning the rail system to protect the public from the electrified overhead lines.

The white, grey and yellow safety screens have been designed by Pollen (Wellington) and manufactured in Christchurch. Service Engineers was responsible for the manufacture and installation of brackets to enable the installation of the safety screens. Crews from Service Engineers were responsible for both the installation of the bracket fixings and the safety screens, they also were responsible for a substantial amount of earthing and bonding work, ensuring the electrical safety of the bridges and the general public.

The project was complicated, with so many parties involved (contractors, consultants, engineers and designers alike), and the constraints on working conditions: installation work is generally undertaken at night, or when the rail network is shut down for maintenance over holidays. The electric wires and the danger of passing trains posed a considerable problem to site work, but Service Engineers rose to the challenge and delivered the project as fast as constraints allowed and with less than minor health and safety problems.