Weekly round-up - 7 December 2015

Structural faults close Forth road bridge, Halley V1 on the move, Network Rail tackles London Bridge chaos, and WYG in the black.

Jackie Whitelaw
06 December 2015

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1. The Forth Road Bridge is to be closed until the new year because of structural faults. A crack been discovered in a vertical steel member – the second to be found. Amey engineers who are in charge of inspections said the 20mm-wide shear crack in a truss under the southbound carriageway close to the bridge's north tower could not have been predicted and happened quickly.

2. According to the Daily Telegraph the award winning Halley V1 ice station designed by AECOM’s Peter Ayres and architect Hugh Broughton, which was built to be able to move, is about to have to prove its worth. The British Antarctic Survey station is in the path of an advancing ice chasm, 160ft deep, 18 miles long and half a mile wide. Bulldozers are to be brought in by sea to tow the ice station’s modules to a new location 20 miles away. 
   

3. Network Rail has agreed to create a £4.1M fund after overcrowding at London Bridge caused "life threatening chaos". Network Rail (NR) was threatened with a £2M penalty after a report found 2014-15 services were "below expectations". It has now offered more than double the proposed fine to improve services and reduce delays on Thameslink, Southern and Gatwick Express services, the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) said.

4. Transport planning specialist, Phil Jones Associates has acquired the majority shareholding in transport modelling firm Multimodal. Established in 2012, Multimodal delivers all elements of microsimulation modelling from concept design testing to fully detailed option modelling and analysis and has undertaken projects for clients such as Jaguar Land Rover and Land Securities. 

5. Black & Veatch has won a place on the Welsh Government construction consultancy framework. The firm will operate in two areas, or lots. The first is Lot 6, which will focus mainly on flood alleviation; much of this work will be for Natural Resources Wales (NRW). The other would be site supervision, which includes environmental and landscaping clerk-of-work roles that come under Lot 9. NRW’s flood risk management capital programme budget for this four-year framework is £20M per annum; of which five to 10 percent will come through Lot 6 each year.

6. Network Rail has picked Atkins, Laing O’Rourke and VolkerRail as its partners to design and build East-West Rail phase 2. The alliance will deliver a rail route linking Oxford, Milton Keynes and Bedford, and Milton Keynes with London Marylebone via Aylesbury. 

7. Skanska and BAM Construct UK have become the first contractors to be BIM 2 accredited using the BSI’s new verification scheme. BSI also said that it is planning to develop a Kitemark for BIM Design and Construction next year, incorporating verification to PAS 1192-2.

8. WYG has reported that orders have increased by 18% to £123M.  In the first six months of the year WYG returned to the black delivering a pre-tax profit of £2.1M compred with a £400,000 loss the year before. Revenue remained flat at £63M.

9. Arcadis has been appointed by Manchester Airports Group as its sole Managed Service Provider, leading a 10-year programme of work to deliver the £1bn Manchester Airport Transformation Programme. As the third largest airport in the UK, Manchester Airport is the global gateway to the North of England and will play a key role in delivering the Northern Powerhouse agenda. Comprising a series of 60 enhancements, the Transformation Programme will increase passenger capacity from 20 million to 30 million passengers by 2025 through the expansion and reconfiguration of Terminal 2 to become the airport’s primary terminal building, along with further improvements of Terminal 3 to cater for increased demand and an expanding flight schedule.