Latest Update from the Environment Agency
Work to install steel sheet piles at River Road resumed on Tuesday 31 March 2020
At the time of writing, 11 of the 81 steel sheet piles have now been installed into the river bed adjacent to properties at River Road.
Together with our suppliers, we are following government guidance that critical construction activities should continue as long as they can comply with Public Health England (PHE) advice. Our works in Arundel will better protect people and properties at risk from flooding and erosion. We continue to ensure that all required measures are in place to allow site staff to operate safely with PHE guidance.
We understand that many of you may have concerns about the impact to yourselves, your families and neighbours at the current time. We are working with our contractors to put in place working practices and arrangements to help reduce the impact that piling will have on the community.
When
piling takes place, there is an initial vibration activity followed by an
impact hammer which installs each pile in turn, with a half an hour break
between each pile. The percussive and vibration piling is not a continuous
activity and there will be natural breaks in this work, for example where we
need to re-position the jack-up barge. This can take a full day to complete.
Multiple piles will initially be placed into the river above design level using
the techniques described. They are then hammered further into the river bed to
their final ‘design’ level. When this is happening, the noise you experience
will be more intense.
We want to provide you with as much information as we can about when the noisiest periods are likely to occur. The working pattern (rather than precise timings of the activities involved) will become clearer as the piling works progress. We are working with our contractor to provide a weekly mini programme of works to help residents plan their day to day lives over this period of disruption. From next week, we will provide this forward look as part of our weekly update. We also understand that noise associated with the work can be disruptive to residents, therefore we are providing earplugs to help mitigate the noisy periods. If you require these, please let us know and we will work with our contractors to get these to you.
We will continue to have noise and vibration monitoring equipment in place and will review our activities and their impact on a daily basis. We will continue to adhere to new and updated guidance on Covid-19 and construction, and will follow any additional direction that may be given to us over the coming days and weeks. This may result in last minute and immediate changes to the status of the project.
What happens next?
There will be no more piling works until Monday 6 April 2020.
Further deliveries of steel sheet piles to River Road car park are expected on Monday 6 April 2020 and Monday 20 April 2020.
We have now removed the temporary bag work from the river at the collapsed section of the wall. It is important that the jack-up barge is repositioned to allow piling to continue at this location without delay. Therefore the jack-up barge will be moved to its new position on Saturday 4 April 2020 and our normal working site hours will change to between 5am to 6pm to complete this activity. You will see the boat and barge move over this period, and there will be noise from the equipment and generators (but no piling activity). We need to work at low tide to move the jack-up barge which is why we will working from the early morning.
There will be no construction activities over the Easter weekend (including Good Friday and Easter Monday).
We appreciate the understanding and kind words we have received from residents in Arundel during construction. We would like to thank all those affected by our activities for their patience and understanding. We will continue to work on minimising the disruption and keep you updated.
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