Yeadon Way, Blackpool

A single-lane two way elevated carriage way was built in 1986 on a railway embankment.  It experienced ongoing settlement and pavement deterioration, a consequence of poor drainage and underlying problems with the embankment.  The brief was to Design and Build a solution to remediate 2 km of the road and embankment. Tenders were only considered if contractors demonstrated that the project would be completed before Whitsun Bank Holiday and would be below the budget (£2.4m). The works commenced immediately after the end of the illuminations.

The works comprised:

• Embankment remediation – stabilised a section of the embankment with Controlled Modulus Columns and re-constructed the top 1.4m of the embankment. The re-constructed section included steepened reinforced earth-side slopes to support the carriageway and alleviate pressure on the failing embankment shoulders. It used basal geogrid strengthening to distribute any differential settlement. We analysed the site investigation and, working with our subcontractor and earthworks designer, we reused all possible fill material, removing 14,000m³ of material from landfill, eliminating 3,000 lorry movements that would have been required if the methodology adopted by Blackpool for Phase1 had been adopted

• Highway construction – We designed the highway construction built-up in accordance with DMRB, including the bituminous layers and re-utilised the arising in the unbound layers. The quality of the completed works and the design was verified by end product compaction testing of the earthworks and Falling Weight Deflectometer testing on top of the unbound layers
• Drainage – A drainage system design was commissioned from Waterco. This relocated the drainage from the centre of the embankment to the embankment haunch to ensure future maintenance would be considerably easier.  To create the haunch we utilised 150-225mm twin-wall pipe and catch-pits with granular bedding created from processing the embankment fills
• Installation of kerbs
• Relocation, resetting and replacement of street furniture
• Replacement of Road Restraint System
• Relocation and replacement of traffic signage and markings
• Replacement street lighting
• Traffic Management – The original contract allowed uni-directional access from the M53 junction due to safety concerns. We proposed an alternative traffic management arrangement to provide access at both ends, trialling this before implementation and it reduced the programme
• Disposal of any materials removed as part of the works