Garden Place Trucks
In January 1939, just as the new year began, trucks began to rumble around urban Hamilton. This was the start of the removal of Garden Place Hill.
There are stories galore about this project, from the nefarious means of getting public approval to the cyclists coming off their bicycles when drizzle dampened the clay on the roads and caused bicycles to slip away. The Waikato Times reported on 24th January 1939 that not only had four ‘girl cyclists’ come down within seconds of each other at the London Street corner, but the postman, departing on his rounds, lost control on the slippery surface and letters and packages were strewn across the road.
We know what it’s like when trucks are carting spoil from a new house excavation – mess all over the road. Worse though in summer, fine dust goes everywhere and gets in where you least expect it, causing shop keepers in town to obtain sixty-five signatures to a petition to have the effects of the removal mitigated.
HCL_01652, Hamilton City Libraries
This image shows the excavator at work. Anglesea Street is to the bottom right of the image.
The trucks ran into the night and residents complained they went round & round & round keeping townsfolk awake! One man had said the trucks were not properly loaded and hence the spillage which left a film of clay dust which, when wet, created such a hazard for traffic.
None of the photos we had gave any impression of the scale of the trucking so did not explain the noise nor the spillage. Then we got the photo below showing ten very small trucks with small trays, especially when compared to today’s earthmoving machinery!
This makes the rumbling and general nuisance palpably clear & easily understood. Ten small V8 Ford engines going non-stop more than twelve hours a day.
Despite the nuisance caused over 80 years ago, it is still impressive to think such an undertaking was completed so quickly with the machinery available at the time.