Progress made on repairs to the Severn Valley Railway’s embankment failure

The Severn Valley Railway reports that significant progress has been made with repairs to its failed embankment at Mor Brook bridge since specialist engineering contractors CML took possession of the site at the beginning of the month.

CML has already excavated more than 2,500 tonnes of material from the track formation and embankment, and has completed temporary culverting works on the watercourse below the bridge to facilitate full access to the embankment for plant and machinery. This will allow further excavation to take place around the collapsed wing wall of the bridge. The SVR’s project manager Antony Bartlam explains further:

‘The next stage is to install a concrete footing. Then, CML will carefully lift in more than 100 huge Legato concrete blocks, each weighing around 2.5 tonnes, onto this to form a solid structure. The blocks are already on site, ready for use.

‘Next, CML will backfill the embankment structure, using alternate layers of geogrid matting and imported aggregate, to tie the new wall into the embankment.

‘They’ll place large L-shaped precast concrete units across the top of the bridge to form a strong base to carry the track bed, ready for the reinstatement of the rail itself. It really is a very clever solution indeed, and CML’s progress is impressive, helped by the recent good weather.’

CML are experts in rail infrastructure, but this particular project has brought some new challenges, as CML contracts manager, Stuart Hale, explains:

‘This really is something different, not just a run-of-the-mill embankment failure. We needed to find a robust and permanent solution that we could build at speed, and which was affordable to a heritage line. It also needed to comply with the local authority’s mitigation measures, working around the watercourse. We’re very glad to now be at the ‘boots-on-the-ground’ stage and looking forward to getting this finished, hopefully with no undue problems.’

The SVR’s managing director, Jonathan ‘Gus’ Dunster added:

‘It’s so satisfying to now be making real progress with this repair. We’ve had a lot of frustrating delays, but all of them were necessary. We needed to get clearance for the temporary culverting of the watercourse for example, along with ecological surveys to determine the impact of the works on wildlife such as otters, fish and crayfish. We also had to work with National Grid, whose high voltage power lines run right across the middle of the site.

‘As soon as the embankment failure happened at the end of January, we saw a tremendous groundswell of support from the public. Thousands of people have donated, and together with money from our insurance company, this has meant we could go ahead with this essential repair work to re-unite the whole length of the line to Bridgnorth.

‘Of course, the question everyone wants answering is – when can the SVR fully re-open? Well, we should have some definite news on that next week, together with the announcement of something rather special to celebrate the reunification of the full 16 miles of the Severn Valley line between Kidderminster and Bridgnorth!’