After city officials hailed the "secure control" of surface subsidence, caused by last week's cave-in of an under-construction subway tunnel near the Bund, experts said yesterday it's still possible to resume construction on the underground project across the Huangpu River in the near future.
Workers spent the whole of yesterday trying to knock down the tilted eight-story office building at the accident site, the last target after an audio and video products market was dismantled at the week-end to prevent land from sinking.
Two hoisting machines swayed huge iron balls to hit the fragmentary construction. However, it may take several days to totally demolish the structure as faster methods, like controlled implosion, may have negative effects on the prevention of surface subsidence in the area, officials said.
The frontier sand-bag floodwall on the Huangpu, which was fortified with a row of steel bars, will be raised from the present 5 meters to 6 meters today.
Experts said it was possible to resume construction once the surface subsidence hazard is tackled.
Shanghai Party Secretary Chen Liangyu inspected the site late on Sunday, saying the city should learn from the mishap and it would offer experience for similar construction projects in other cities of China.
(eastday.com July 8, 2003)
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