Civil engineering projects are all about solving problems and effective decision making. These qualities are stretched further when work has to be carried out in a live working environment – where trains or traffic keep flowing, ships still move freely around ports, and water treatment plants carry on working.
There are many sectors where operational continuity is critical while essential works are carried out. Defence establishments and port facilities, aviation and environmental water management schemes are all examples of where site closures are an absolutely final resort.
With any work in a live operational environment, safety is always the top and non-negotiable priority. This can affect the design of temporary and permanent works as well as how we sequence operations and deliveries.
For example, when Suttle Projects carried out an extensive project to replace 20 timber groynes within the Poole Bay sea defence scheme, we managed to keep the promenade open to the public throughout, while managing a carefully sequenced series of beach closures to safely renew the structures.
Where Novel Challenges Meet Fresh Ideas
The projects and sites we work on are always unique. Watercourses, embankments, cuttings and coastal defences might share some general characteristics, but the specific features of each location present distinct and novel challenges. And with those challenges come unique risks that have to be managed to keep the site functioning.
An example of the creative problem solving often needed comes from the project to stabilise the 1.2km long railway embankment at Langport. Our innovative methodologies for piling, excavation, backfill and drainage enabled the stabilisation to be completed almost entirely with the railway fully operational.
Our engineers solved the problem of handling 23m long piles directly next to the rail track by designing and installing a novel piling gate, which eliminated the possibility of piles striking a moving train while being positioned.
Perhaps this illustrates the most important point of all: when you empower experienced teams to make decisions – you can come up with innovative approaches that avoid the easy option of closing the site. This is the essence of our projects: simplified approach to delivery.
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