NETWORK RAIL INJECTS £1 MILLION TO STABILISE EMBANKMENTS

Thursday 15 Apr 2004

NETWORK RAIL INJECTS £1 MILLION TO STABILISE EMBANKMENTS

Region & Route:: | Southern

Network Rail is in the middle of a project to stabilise sections of a railway embankment between Rayleigh and Hockley railway stations in Essex. The four-month project concentrates on two different sites. The first site is near Rayleigh station and is 300 metres long. The embankment is being stabilised by installing gabion rock baskets containing 1,000 tons of rock. Air percussion soil nailing rigs then inject 1,052 hollow steel nails varying in size from nine to 14 metres into the embankment. The nails are pumped full of grout. The embankment is then be netted and grassed. The other area we are working on is near Hockley station and this part of the embankment is being stabilised by a method of sheet piling. 53 metres of embankment is being worked on. Due to the proximity to residential areas we are using a completely silenced piling rig. There is also a crane on site feeding the piling rig. Derek Butcher, Network Rail Regional Earth Works and Drainage Engineer said: “This is a very complex job, but we have carefully chosen the methods to suit the job in hand, the need to keep the railway open and the area around the railway. The work to the embankments will ensure that further wet weather will not affect its stability and will extend the length of the embankments for many years to come.”

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