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Even experienced project manager Dave Stott is finding the retirement village project in Neville Street a challenge.
When it comes to construction and management, few could rival the knowledge of Kaipara Flats project manager Dave Stott.
Dave, aged 68, has a degree in civil engineering from Auckland University and is managing the retirement village project in Warkworth on Neville Street.
During his career he has worked on projects all over the world, including Spaghetti Junction in Auckland, the motorway from Jedda to Mecca in the Middle-East and the Thames Barrier project in England, which cost a quarter of a billion pounds in 1972.
He returned to NZ from the UK in 1974 and headed a committee for government subsidised aid projects and helped set up Oxfam in New Zealand.
He then became involved in project management and managed construction of the first Montessori School in New Zealand called Wa Ora, in Wellington.
He became president of the Montessori Association New Zealand and set up two degrees for Montessori teachers training at AUT.
He also helped set up the major Montessori congress held in Sydney in 2007.
One of his biggest challenges was his involvement in a legal battle with New Zealand Rail and Westinghouse UK.
After delays on electrification of the railway from Palmerston North to Hamilton, Westinghouse had its contract terminated.
“I had to travel with barristers to the UK seven times as an expert witness before finally the company received a $39 million payout in 1990 after claims and counterclaims.”
Another difficult project for Dave was the reconstruction of Mt Eden prison, from 2008 to 2011.
“That was interesting,” he says.
“We had to operate in high security areas on many occasions and at one stage we had to cut a hole through a wall into a high security unit.”
One of Dave’s favourite projects was the restoration of the Regent Theatre in Palmerston North, which had closed in 1991.
“The restoration retained the original grandeur of the building, but we also fitted modern technologies so we were extremely proud of the finished job,” he says.
“I like to have an inclusive approach to every project I undertake,” he says.
“Projects often involve big complex ideas coming together so a lot of it is about managing people.”
The Oaks retirement apartments in Warkworth has presented a number of challenges.
“We’ve struck some major water issues which are well and above what we originally anticipated,” he says.
“There are 119 conditions in our resource consent including checking the levels of surrounding buildings which is very costly.
“Because it is quite a small site, you tend to solve one problem and find there are two more.
“It’s very hard to get traction.”
The other major part of his management career has involved setting up dairy factories for Fonterra and Tetra Pak.
He says getting the equipment inside the buildings is the real challenge.
“The projects are often in remote places and you have to coordinate things well to manoeuvre fittings inside, which is about 75 per cent of the construction cost normally.”
Dave currently has no projects lined up after the retirement village is complete but isn’t bothered.
“I have always been lucky really,” he says.
“I have never had to advertise; people have just come looking for me.”
