01.01.12
Education is critical
Source: Rail Technology Magazine Dec/Jan 2012
Efforts being made by the United Kingdom Society for Trenchless Technology (UKSTT) to educate and inform rail industry engineering staff and their contractors are essential, says Peter Crouch, UKSTT Technical Secretary, who here reviews the steps being made to improve and update industry awareness of trenchless capability and proven track record in the rail sector.
There is a perception that the historically fragmented local-based approach to rail sector works by Railtrack (and Network Rail) and their contractors created a parochial isolationist decision hierarchy driving poor quality slow decisions based on historic and anecdotal experiences when selecting or agreeing to the use of trenchless systems and techniques on their local rail networks.
Following ‘Railtex’ last year, UKSTT and its members continue to demonstrate to the rail industry their willingness and enthusiasm to meet the challenges of working on rail infrastructure projects throughout the UK.
In addition to the significant amount of work in other sectors, many companies engaged within the trenchless industry, who work alongside major contractors or directly with rail infrastructure owners, have Achilles Link-Up and are approved to work with rail infrastructure companies.
The technologies have developed tremendously over the years. Cured in place pipe lining systems (CIPP) have improved, enabling the use of air and steam to invert liners as well as ultraviolet light curing, making the process much faster and quicker, which results in less disruption – which is the whole idea.
With rail operators loath to implement maintenance works that cause lengthy delays or require alternate routes causing inconvenience to commuters, these trenchless systems are ideal for an industry that has huge infrastructure maintenance liabilities.
The rail sector has tended to neglect trackside drainage and sub grade. Some of them are eight to ten metres underground so they are easily forgotten. However, with the Environment Agency recently recognising that some of these culverts are causing underground flooding, culverts will have to be thoroughly assessed, as will trackside drainage.
This should bring more business opportunities for the trenchless industry, including the possibility of working with London Underground. Infrastructure owners will be forced to place higher priority on this work where some brick culverts have been in place for 80 to 100 years and a collapse would mean serious problems.
Our focus is also on the need to educate and update the rail industry about the proven capabilities of trenchless systems, which have enabled adjacent assets to be repaired with little or no loss of line access or availability to the rail operator. That is once they understood the proposed trenchless system as well as the overall approach to the works.
It must be clearly stated that safety is first in everyone’s minds but frustrations in having to re-persuade each rail engineer in each rail network area every time a trenchless system is proposed that it is proven, safe, and reliable is inefficient, costly, and frustrating.
Perhaps the latest reorganisation of the industry will offer opportunity to educate through seminar and roadshow attendance by rail owners, engineers and their contractors. To capture this opportunity, UKSTT will be running a series of articles in RTM introducing the society and offering an overview of the technology, followed by articles with case studies on various techniques including pipe bursting, pipe lining and auger boring.
Tell us what you think – have your say below, or email us directly at [email protected]