44 | Safeguarding the community Flood banks being formed to protect Gore residents from flooding on the Mataura River. Linton Contracting CONTRACTING Randall Johnston TOTAL FUEL SOLUTIONS Keeping the tank full and machinery running » Bulk fuel deliveries » Mobil Lubricants » Fuel storage » Nationwide fuel stops alliedpetroleum.co.nz 0800 383 566 PROUDLY SUPPORTING LINTON CONTRACTING Southland and Otago’s Independently owned Ford dealership No Hidden Fees • No Hidden Commissions • Total Transparency Donaldson Brown is proudly 100% New Zealand owned. www.donaldsonbrown.co.nz With flooding events becoming increasingly common, Linton Contracting is doing its bit to help keep residents and their assets safe for years to come. Linton Contracting won an Environment Southland tender to complete flood bank construction in Gore and strengthening work in Wyndham to protect residents from the Mataura River during high rainfall events. While Linton Contracting had done similar work in the past, this is the first flood mitigation project it has done directly with Environment Southland, rather than being involved as a sub-contractor – so winning the tender was a fairly major milestone for the business. “The Edendale Bypass, which we completed in 2020, was a multi-million dollar project – and involved a considerable quantity of earthworks as well as road construction. We were subcontracted by Fulton Hogan for that project and the experience did help us in our tender for the Gore and Wyndham flood bank project.” The original plan was to do six sites along the river bank but this was reduced to three due to funding constraints. Work started on these in February this year. The first stage (north east Wyndham) was competed in April and the Ontario Street section at Gore was finished in October. The third section (southwest Wyndham) is about 70 percent complete and will be finished by Christmas. A crew of between 10 and 18 (including truck drivers) has been busy on the project, so it has involved most of the Linton Contracting team. “It’s required a combination of our 50-tonne, two 30-tonne and three 20-tonne Volvo excavators onsite going flat out to get the job done. We have also used articulated dump trucks and road trucks as required. One of the 30-tonne excavators is only a year old and was bought especially for this job, so it’s fairly new gear.” “The majority of the gravel used to build the Ontario Street flood bank was extracted directly from an island sitting in the Mataura River, at Mataura,” Linton Contracting Director Peter Morgan says explains. “The island has formed over time after gravels have washed down from upstream. We have taken roughly 50,000 tonne from the island, which should help relieve the pressure on the banks of the main channel.” “Our operator Bjorn has been busy loading the trucks with our 50-tonne Volvo excavator, alongside Joe and Harrison on the roller, keeping the island track compacted enough for the trucks to be able to loop back onto the road.” In the early days the business was called Geoff Linton Contracting and it was based in Cromwell. “Over time the majority of the work ended up being in Southland so he migrated to Winton, but that was probably about 30 years ago now,” Peter explains. The company went through a slight change of ownership in 2003 and became Linton Contracting Ltd.” A further change in 2021 saw the company back into “private” ownership. With now having such a major flood bank project under its belt and demand for water infrastructure among farmers in Southland and Otago ramping up, the future looks bright for Linton Contracting.
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