Maintaining and repairing our transportation systems' infrastructure is crucial to its safety and smooth-running.
As our population and cities grow, roads and highways projects are becoming more complex. They are often in congested or built-up areas, where minimal disruption is vital. With squeezed budgets, strict project schedules and built in delay clauses, our customers are left with little margin for error.
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What is highways temporary works?
Highways temporary works refers to the construction, maintenance and repair of highways and their assets, such as bridges and the temporary works equipment needed to carry out these works.
With each local highways authority responsible hundreds of bridges, many are introducing weight limitations to less than 44t so bridges are not deemed substandard. Structural monitoring can help local highways authorities understand the status of their bridges to prioritise their maintenance schedules.
Source: RAC Foundation Survey, March 2023.
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How temporary works can support highway repairs, maintenance and emergencies
Bridge pier repairs - bridge piers or supports can deteriorate over time due to weather, corrosion or age, which all contribute to structural damage. Propping and jacking systems enable a bridge deck to be lifted whilst maintenance to internal, difficult-to-reach parts areas is carried out.
Route reinstatement after flooding - deployed in hours, temporary bridges are often required when flooding occurs, to reconnect routes and limit disruption to transport networks whilst damaged roads are repaired.
Reopening motorways after bridge strikes - one of the main reasons for bridge strikes is due to taller vehicles not anticipating lower clearance heights underneath structures. Our emergency response team can rapidly secure the structure with our propping and jacking systems whilst a permanent solution is sought.
Proactive maintenance with highways monitoring
Proactively monitoring highways bridges can help prevent disruption to traffic flows and potential asset failures. For their safety, bridges are designed to flex depending on weight of traffic and temperature changes. Bridge failures can occur when movement of component parts is restricted or become blocked. Bridge bearings and expansion joints are mostly susceptible to this, due to road residue, general fatigue and environmental conditions. With restricted movement, bridge pier decks can also fail due to increased tension.
We position displacement sensors under a bridge deck to monitor the effect on its structural integrity with different loads. These sensors can also monitor bridge bearings and produce real-time data to help identify the urgency of required maintenance, repair or replacement. Further bridge monitoring is used to detect changes outside normal bridge expansion which can cause failure to expansion joints.
A trusted temporary works partner
We’ve helped deliver thousands of projects across roads and highways, so we can help you overcome your project challenges.
We’ll be there for as much or as little of your project as you need. Whether you need a simple equipment hire, a pre-designed standard solution, a bespoke design or a temporary works partner throughout, we can meet your challenges and deliver the right solution.
Bringing your design solution to life with immersive technology
We're always looking for ways we can improve the way we design in temporary works, ensuring those crucial, first stages of construction are as safe and efficient as possible. Using immersive technology, EVE allows you to explore your design like never before. You can take a virtual walk through your project and identify any changes or potential risks before any work begins on site.
Discover how you can make your design phase more efficient than ever here.
Taking care of the future
Our activities help shape the world we live in and leave a lasting impact. Our ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) strategy sets out how we’re taking responsibility for these goals to achieve a sustainable future, from the way we behave and operate as a business, to the actions we all take every day.
Find out full ESG strategy here >
