Engineering Focus

It has been 4 months since we last posted an update about the  Mersey Gateway  project which once complete will bridge the River Mersey. From a vantage point on the banks of Wigg Island Community Park (Runcorn) it's difficult to see if much progress has been made, but on further inspection is clear a lot has happened since February. One of the key milestones that was finished in May 2015 was the completion of Halton's first new bridge over the Mersey in 54 years. The new trestle bridge which crosses the Mersey is a temporary structure which will be used as a platform from which workers will construct the new bridge. Other work to construct the bridge has been ongoing inside 2 out of the 3 coffer dams constructed in the river, however progress has been out of sight for the most part. Work has been progressing within the walls of the north and south dams in order to excavate an enormous hole into which concrete will be poured. The concrete will act as foundations for the 3 l

Norton Bridge In part one we looked in general at the Stafford Area Improvement Programme, in part two we will look in more detail at Norton Bridge. This part of the project involves constructing 6 miles of new railway and a new grade separated junction which will remove a key bottleneck. Work to construct 6 miles of new 100mph railway and flyover at Norton Bridge began in spring 2014 and has been progressing well since with several key milestone complete. 3 high pressure gas mains and 1 aviation fuel pipeline have been moved, 4 out of 5 rail over river crossing have also been complete. One of the key milestones which was completed earlier this month (June 2015) was the construction of bridge 5 which will eventually carry the diverted B5026 over the existing railway, The completion of bridge 5 means that earth can be transported safely within the site by articulated haul trucks. Each 6 wheel haul truck can carry up to 30 tonnes of earth at a time from a large cutting to else

The Stafford Area Improvement Programme (SAIP) is currently one of the largest single rail projects under construction outside of London. The £250m project which is split into 3 packages aims to remove a key bottleneck from a congested section of the WCML north of Stafford. Package 1 which was completed in May 2014 increased the speed of a section of the down slow line between Crewe and Stafford from 75mph to 100mph. This package involved the installation of 4 new banner repeater signals, re-alignment of 5 miles of track and modification of 18 miles of over head line equipment. Package 2 involves the renewal of signalling equipment on the route from Norton Bridge to Penkridge and Stafford. The re-signalling works involves installing 78 new signals, construction of a new 775m passing loop and complete re-signalling of signal boxed 4 and 5 Package 3 which is by far largest package will see the construction of a new grade separated junction, 6 miles of new railway, as well as 11 n

Plantworx is billed as " The UK's dedicated working construction exhibition " and it certainly lived up to it's billing. The event which is held once every two years hosts an array of live exhibits from the biggest names from the world of plant machinery. Not only could you see what's new, you could also try out a large array of machines in live demonstration plots. Below are some of my highlights from this year's Plantworx. Komatsu impressed the crowds with it's PC210 LCi paired with Komatsu's unique intelligent Machine Control. Here the operator was demonstrating the machine's automatic real time digging control, which allows the operator to set the dig depth. Once the depth has been programmed, the machine will not allow the operator to dig below that depth. Komatsu claim that this system "i mproves site safety " and "d rastically improves efficiency " Wacker Neuson had on display innovative solutions for