What makes this laughable is that if a developer wants to lay a service to a subdivision, and that service cannot be placed deep enough, the service authorities insist on concrete being placed over the service "to protect it". Further, "no dig" technologies are very advanced, and have been developed to avoid this very problem.
One is led to the conclusion that service authorities are demanding upgrades to their systems paid for by the light rail.  In fact, what should happen is that the service authorities get a bill for the excess cost over the price of "no dig" works.
Do that once, and I'm sure they won't do it again.
Mark Skinner 

Sent on the go with Vodafone

-------- Original message --------
From: "Matthew Geiermatthew@... [TramsDownUnder]" TramsDownUnder@...>
Date: 5/06/2017 1:14 PM (GMT+09:30)
To:TramsDownUnder@...
Subject: Re: [TramsDownUnder] Re: Further delays to Sydney CBD light rail construction leave retailers struggling

On 05/06/17 10:20,prescottt@... [TramsDownUnder] wrote:

>


> They do have great problems


> with George St because nobody obviously thought that trams would ever go


> along it again and in the intervening 60 years there's been a


> free-for-all with services and it's right in the heart of a major city


> so there are a lot of them. It must be a nightmare for the project people.


>

Also the insane paranoia about having any service under the tracks. Even

30 years ago they would have just put track slab right over the top and

only worried about access pits and the like.

Now the track is 2m thick concrete and absolutely nothing must run under it.

Also I've spoken to a tradie (who has a mate, that sort of conversation

:-). The process of dealing with services found to be 'in the way' has

been extremely long winded and fiddly. The labourers doing the work

actually love it - lots of 'rest breaks' while the 'nobs upstairs'

figure out the next step.

The guy I spoke to said his mate was starting to find it frustrating, as

he was spending more time standing around doing nothing than actual

work. But the pay was good.