Queensland Urban Utilities and Rob Carr Civil Construction and Tunneling have involved local students in a new water and sewerage project for Brisbane.
The students helped to name and design the tunnel borer for a $17million water and sewerage project.
The project includes a cross-river pipeline from Kenmore to Jindalee, which involves laying a separate water main and sewer main inside a tunnel 10m below the Brisbane River.
The new water and sewerage project will also include 2km of new sewer mains and 600m of new water mains on the Jindalee side of the river.
Queensland Urban Utilities spokesperson, Michelle Cull, said year three students at four local schools were invited to come up with a name and design for the tunnel borer.
“We received more than 200 entries from Kenmore, Kenmore South and Jindalee State Schools as well as Our Lady of the Rosary Primary School,” Ms Cull said.
“There were so many fabulous ideas, but there can only be two winners and they were Olivia Harm from Jindalee State School and Luke Lau from Kenmore South State School.”
Olivia’s winning name for the tunnel borer, ‘Kenji’, combined the suburb names Kenmore and Jindalee, while Luke winning design had bright red and yellow flames.
The winning design and name will be painted onto the giant tunnel borer which will carve a 1.7m diameter tunnel underneath the river.
“Kenji is due to swing into action early next year. She’ll be lowered by a crane into a shaft at Kingfisher Park, Kenmore before breaking rock deep below the river,” Ms Cull said.
“After around five months she’ll pop out the other side, near the Jindalee Scout Hall.”
Once completed, the new pipeline will improve the reliability of water and sewerage services in Queensland’s western suburbs.
