Soil Mechanics Circumnavigates the M25

Friday 30 April 2010

Highways Agency: The Demands of Pavement Construction and Conditioning
To finalise the handover of the M25 pavement construction and condition to the sphere manager, the Highways Agency were faced with some urgent challenges, not least the immediate need to finish the pavement investigation along its entire 117 mile stretch against unyielding time pressures. With this in mind, they needed a geotechnical contractor who could complete the field work in under 8 weeks so that year end financial targets for a possible widening scheme could be met.

Motorways: Managing, Maintaining and Improving
The potential provided by some of the latest testing techniques was key to The Highways Agency's vision for major projects like this involving fast turnaround project management and collaborative working between suppliers, keeping traffic moving and maintaining and operating safe roads.

Soil Mechanics: Proactive and Committed to Best Practice
The Highways Agency, had a simple brief: They wanted a contractor to project manage the field work according to NEC conditions of contract and deliver a factual report which would enable them to understand the pavement construction and condition. With the size and complexity of the project and the handover deadline looming they needed someone to deliver complete data acquisition in an accurate, safe and timely manner with minimal disruption to traffic.

Soil Mechanics: Planning for Project Success

• A clear action plan enabled the smooth running of the project with pre agreed traffic management and work crews
• A proactive focus on the use of resources with multiple crews working in lane one in both directions, but also in the hard shoulder, lane two and climbing lanes undertaking Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) work.
• Appropriate resources and skills for multi-disciplined activities included teams for road coring every 500 meters in asphalt; every 250 meters in concrete to 152 mm diameter; with TRL probes used to depths of 2 meters to provide CBR values for stress testing.
• A separate team working in unison on highway inspection recording rutting and cracking
• Organised traffic management at 4km gaps in between closures
• A quality assurance agent ensured the accuracy and timely delivery of logging data

Repeatable Data: Faster, Non-intrusive, In situ Testing
A truck mounted Falling Weight Deflectometer provided regular readings to measure the strength quality of the pavement sub base in lane one. The speed with which this gathered data working around each of the four closures per night meant that a mass of dynamic loading data could be gathered and tested to provide instant values in situ in order to complement the core testing.

Total Project Management: Supplier Collaboration
Pete Reading, Associate Director of Soil Mechanics sees that planning for success and the use of non intrusive techniques along with collaborative working as the key to major Highways Agency and other projects. Of this he says, "Taking over some of the logistical tasks generally the domain of the consulting engineers such as the booking of road space and pre-planning of road closures saves time on pavement investigations of this size and nature. Having greater control and flexibility meant that teams could be co-ordinated more efficiently and communication on the project between all stakeholders was effective."

Soil Mechanics: Completing the Circle
Frank Digby of international consulting firm, Hyder Consulting (UK) Ltd said, "The advantage of choosing Soil Mechanics is the breadth and depth of service they provide. As well as all the traditional coring and in situ methods, for this project they also provided material testing of black top and concrete layers to ensure the quality and integrity of the aggregates and a number of unusual techniques including 'integrated testing' which enabled the same sample to be tested a number of times for binder recovery, penetration and softening. It is a comprehensive service."

Top Service Advantages from Soil Mechanics:

• Qualified personnel adhering to agreed procedures and practices
• Seamless project planning of personnel, resources and communication
• Innovative techniques and operational skills for a timely implementation
• Year end financial benefits and fast return on investment
• Timely management of integrated practices
• A collaborative work ethic
• Comprehensive testing capability

Project date: March 07 to April 07

Related Information:

Client: The Highways Agency
Consulting Engineer: Hyder Consulting (UK) Ltd 

Services:

• Geotechnical testing
• Concrete coring
• Dynamic cone
• Materials testing
• Falling Weight Deflectometer
• Ground penetrating radar
• In situ testing
• Factual reporting

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