42 | T T Karen Phelps Water from six villages no easy task The Rongotea connection of Manawatū District Council’s wastewater centralisation project is on track for completion by August 2026, following the successful implementation of the Sanson stage. The programme involves piping wastewater from six villages - Halcombe, Sanson, Rongotea, Awahuri, Cheltenham and Kimbolton - to the Manawatū Wastewater Treatment Plant in Feilding for centralised treatment and disposal. Rongotea is a rural village in the southern part of Manawatū with a population of approximately 700 residents. The Rongotea leg of the system includes two pump stations and 15km of wastewater pressure mains into Feilding. “We are currently awarding the main pump station construction contract for Rongotea,” says Michael Taylor, delivery manager utilities at Manawatū District Council. “In the meantime we have nearly finished the pipe network and are partway through building the first pump station.” He says the construction of pump stations is complex. “Even though they don’t look much to the eye, they are quite big undertakings and typically involve a lot of civil, mechanical and electrical work,” says Michael. “They take six to twelve months to build. We spent quite a bit of time in the design phase as there are some unique challenges,” explains Michael. “We have to build them with infrastructure deep underground, and geological conditions on site are challenging. We have high ground water and sand. As we have to dig deep holes, up to 7m deep, in wet sand a big part of the design process was figuring out how to stabilise it.” The solution has involved sheet piling and de-watering techniques, with the most demanding construction work scheduled for the drier summer months between December and February. Michael says the Rongotea project builds on lessons learned from the Sanson implementation, which was completed earlier last year. That phase included 13.7 kilometres of pipeline and three pump stations, serving not only Sanson residents but also handling wastewater from RNZAF Base Ōhakea. The Sanson connection presented its own engineering challenges, with the pipeline climbing 85 metres higher than the village itself before becoming a gravity line for the final six kilometres. Three 70-cubic-metre underground storage tanks provide emergency storage capacity and the pump The programme involves piping wastewater from six villages - Halcombe, Sanson, Rongotea, Awahuri, Cheltenham and Kimbolton - to the Manawatū Wastewater Treatment Plant. INFRASTRUCTURE Manawatū District Council
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