Central Otago Queenstown Trail Network Trust chairman Stephen Jeffery said yesterday contractors were ‘‘making good progress’’ on the trail and, one month into the job, ‘‘everything’s going to plan’’.
However, contractors were working on ‘‘relatively easy terrain’’ at present, and the ‘‘really difficult’’ parts of the trail were still to come, Mr Jeffery said.
These were midway through the Cromwell Gorge, where clip-on bluff bridges would be installed along some rocky sections.
Work on the 54km trail, which will follow the true right of Lake Dunstan from Pisa Moorings to Bannockburn and then through the gorge to the Dunstan Arm Rowing Club, near Clyde, has started in two different places.
One contractor started at Pisa Moorings and will go to the Bannockburn Bridge and then to Cornish Point, just south of Cromwell.
Tenders for that section were being considered this week and the successful tenderer would likely be announced by July 15, Mr Jeffery said.
He said it was hoped parts of the Pisa Moorings to Cornish Point section would be completed by Christmas.
The trail is part of the $26million New Zealand Cycle Trail Project, funded by the Government, the Central Lakes Trust and the Otago Community Trust.
It will form part of 536km of new trails connecting Cromwell to other Central Otago, Queenstown and Wanaka trails.
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So much for the idea that cycling is an environmentally friendly activity. And so much for a clean, green NZ. This is sad.
It's not like the Cromwell Gorge is pristine and untouched. There's a man-made lake running through the middle, a new highway on the true left, and a huge amount of earthworks on the hillsides, both sides, all through that area. One more thin line added to the hillside just above the lake level isn't too dramatic, and will fade eventually as well. Creating a cycleway to encourage people out of buses/cars and onto bicycles, linking OCRT through to Cromwell and eventually Queenstown&Wanaka is a very good addition.