Holdfast Training Services Trial Blog

Well the Network Rail Road was meant to open on the 26th Apr but due to various issues that I will go into a bit later that did not happen and only a small portion was opened. Grand opening number two was the 30th Jun and I hoped to write a great blog with pictures of us all celebrating a milestone, but 2 weeks later we are still not finished. So why has such a simple task of building an access road been so difficult I hear you all ask. Let me explain…

Here is what was explained to me back in Feb:

Mission: To construct the Network Rail Access Road once all services have been installed.

Concept of Operations
Intent: To open the Network Rail Road for construction traffic.

Scheme of Manoeuvre: Install deep foul drainage, then surface water drainage, followed by shallow services such as HV, potable water, rising main and comms, install the final road build up and surface.  The diagram below highlights the main locations with the road running along the left side of the picture.

Main Effort:  To open the road for construction traffic use by 26 Apr.

Constraints:  The road is bounded by the Network Rail arches (the main line into Victoria) in the West, the sheet pile cofferdam of the basement in the East and the River Wall to the North.

Again it all sounded pretty straightforward, the sub-contractor had a realistic looking programme and they had already made good headway on part of the deep drainage when I turned up in Feb.  So what has gone wrong?

Issue 1.  The major problem has been a temporary works issue that arose from a contractual decision.  The capping beam of the sheet pile cofferdam for the basement was originally in the groundworks sub-contractors (O’Keefe) package but as a cost saving effort it was taken out and put into the concrete frame sub-contractors scope (Byrne Brothers).  With the contractual team happy in the thought that they had saved a few pennies the construction team carried on building.  It then became apparent at the start of March that we kind of needed the capping beam to hold up the road that we were building and now the contractor had changed it wasn’t going to be built for a few more months. 

Solution: To cut a long story short we ended up getting O’Keefe to design a temporary retaining wall for the road to allow the construction of the road and the formation of the capping beam.  This was in the form of a king post wall made from UCs and trench sheeting and pre-cast L-sections (my idea stolen from John’s retaining wall lectures!).  The pre-cast sections were suitable for south of the pumping station where they would fit in with the services but not for the north.  These were installed quite quickly and the south section of road was opened on the 26th Apr as planned.  The king post wall installation added another 6 weeks and probably 10’s of thousands of pounds to the cost of the groundworks package. 

Issue 2:  The road level was designed to give enough cover for the shallowest main service which was the rising main.  The Project Director wanted as many of the smaller branch connections to supply the bridge arches (mostly clay drainage pipes) in as possible prior to the surfacing of the road.  Once constructed it was apparent that these were not going to have enough cover under the road.

Solution:  Ramp over them, chuck some trench plates over the top and hope they don’t get trashed! 

Issue 3:  Nobody had actually designed the northern section of the road.  The design engineers Buro Happold had helped with the suggested temporary levels of the main part of the road and this was signed off by the Carillion Temp Works Designer (TWD) (who doesn’t work on site or solely on this project).

Solution: The Carillion Project Manager suggested an idea to the TWD, he said no, we amended the design to his comments, the Environment Agency Flood Defence Consent people said yes so we cracked on and built it. 

Issue 4:  On the grand opening take 2 on the 30th Jun the Project Director walked the road with Byrne Brothers (who will be the main user) and they deemed it was not fit for purpose.  Despite being built to the designs it was both not wide enough (for 2 way traffic) and too wide (not enough room to construct the capping beam).  They had intended to have unloading areas for the tower cranes and vehicles passing at numerous points along the road. 

Solution:  Remove the pedestrian walkway, push the vehicle barriers closer to the edge, make it wider in the north (ignoring the design of one TWD and using another ones design that allowed for more surcharge on the sheet piles) and hold your breath and close your eyes as your truck squeezes past the artic lorry:

So what have I learnt from this rather frustrating and costly ordeal? 

Communication is key.  The section engineer in charge of Byrne Brothers is too busy to attend construction team meetings and therefore has never communicated the actual intended use of the road.  If the sub-contractor and I were told that they intended to unload vehicles then we could have flagged up the width issue months ago.  We could have also planned the barrier system to ensure the widths were adequate rather than build everything then strip it out again.

Plans should be war gamed.  The decision to remove the capping beam installation from the groundworks package has significantly affected the road construction.  Changes to the plan should be communicated and discussed with everyone that it may affect so problems can be identified early. 

Have a clear reporting chain.  Too many people have been involved in making rushed and ill-informed decisions with regards to the road and nobody has been the single point of contact in charge of it’s construction.  I was given the responsibility of monitoring the installation but it became apparent that I had not be told the end user’s actual requirements.  Decisions were made by the Construction Manager that then didn’t work on site and he should have delegated the responsibility of designing a solution to me or one of the other section engineers who work frequently on the site.  We could then brief potential solutions to allow the senior management to make an informed decision.

Well tomorrow I get to draw up the second sketch of remedial works and hopefully some white line loading bays will get painted on the road on Sat and I can have the grand opening take 3 on Mon.  In the mean time I will be trying to help design an elevated footpath to help widen the road some more!  I think a more detailed (and slightly less sarcastic) analysis of these technical and managerial issues associated with the Network Rail Road could be the next TMR topic for me.