Minworth embankment repair

[Iain_S]

16 hours ago, nicknorman said:

Hmmmmm, from Wikipedia (which, as we know, is always right):

 

it is often stated that the Union Flag should only be described as the Union Jack when flown in the bows of a warship, but this is a relatively recent idea. From early in its life the Admiralty itself frequently referred to the flag as the Union Jack, whatever its use, and in 1902 an Admiralty circular announced that Their Lordships had decided that either name could be used officially. In 1908, a government minister stated, in response to a parliamentary question, that "the Union Jack should be regarded as the National flag"

Do you believe what the government says?

[matty40s]

4 minutes ago, Iain_S said:

Do you believe what the government says?

Do the government believe what the government say ......

[Alan de Enfield]

51 minutes ago, matty40s said:

Do the government believe what the government say ......

But, do you believe that the Government believe what the Government say..........

[carlt]

22 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

But, do you believe that the Government believe what the Government say..........

 

[Alan de Enfield]

3 minutes ago, carlt said:

 

Ah, yes, I remember it well

 

 

[alan_fincher]

Isn't this more appropriate to Nick Norman's original complaint?

 

[Tuscan]

 

[nicknorman]

Jeff took a trip to the lock this evening. Photos hardly need any comment!

 

 

 

 

So all those added stones/rocks in my original picture are mostly still there. And compare the presence of water just below the lock, with the depth of water in this last shot. No wonder we were bumping and grinding and going nowhere (is there a song about that?).

[Alan de Enfield]

27 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

So all those added stones/rocks in my original picture are mostly still there.

And, those that are no longer there at the ones 'kicked-out' by your prop.!!!!!!

 

One word - INCOMPETENT

Incompetent contractors and incompetent management of the contractors.

 

It'll be interesting to see how C&RT manage to turn this around such that it is 'boaters fault' as all the other problems are made out to be

[jonesthenuke]

10 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

And, those that are no longer there at the ones 'kicked-out' by your prop.!!!!!!

 

One word - INCOMPETENT

Incompetent contractors and incompetent management of the contractors.

 

It'll be interesting to see how C&RT manage to turn this around such that it is 'boaters fault' as all the other problems are made out to be

" INCOMPETENT" I completely agree. Expectations fully met.

It will be interesting to see what quality of remediation is undertaken. I hope its a lot better than pulling out the just worst bits of rubble.

Edited April 16, 2018 by jonesthenuke

[Rob-M]

It has always been a stoney pound though, a few years ago I ran aground and jumped off the boat on to the canal bed and walked to the bank without getting wet or muddy feet due to the amount of stone.

[billh]

49 minutes ago, Rob-M said:

It has always been a stoney pound though, a few years ago I ran aground and jumped off the boat on to the canal bed and walked to the bank without getting wet or muddy feet due to the amount of stone.

That's as maybe , but that hardcore in the pictures is fresh crushed concrete put in recently, otherwise it would be black and mud covered.This sort of thing has been going on for years, often remains of temporary clay dams ("stanks",up north) where just sufficient is removed to not be visible at normal water level . Latest I've seen is a stack of "Heras" fencing that had been round some lock repair  work  neatly left in the tail of the lock, even if vandals had chucked it in , someone should have accounted for it when it went off hire  and recovered it.

 

[john6767]

So it is very clear from the water each side of the area that it is shallow in that section compared to the tail of the lock and further down the pound.  Given there does not appear to be any equipment there, how will this be dealt with from this point do we think?

[billh]

9 minutes ago, john6767 said:

  Given there does not appear to be any equipment there, how will this be dealt with from this point do we think?

Can't bring floating equipment in , there's nowt to float in. Perhaps a temporary timber road down that nice new cycleway with excavator and appropriate sized dump trucks? All very expensive and messy. Doing  it manually with "volunteers" in the canal would nowadays be regarded  as a health & safety nightmare.

Thinking a bit more, they can put an excavator IN the canal using the hardcore road that they obviously left in place  for that purpose and retreat along the canal digging it away as they go.

[pearley]

This picture which shows the rebuilt wash wall would appear to show, by the nicely graded bank, that all the silt/muck was put back against the wall. 

Edited April 17, 2018 by pearley

[Boater Sam]

Only way I can describe it is Shameful.

These people are supposed to know their job. And lets not forget, its OUR canal, not theirs that they have messed up.

[billS]

On ‎12‎/‎04‎/‎2018 at 20:46, nicknorman said:

Yes I’d say so. As it happens, it’s looking like Jeff is going to drive down to the boat on Saturday and may have a look too. So if you see a red mini with white bonnet stripes and a Union Jack on the roof, you could say hello!

Did he have that car in Aberdeen during the Independence referendum? If so, I'm surprised it hasn't been vandalised by some of the Salmond spawn.

Edited April 17, 2018 by billS

[alan_fincher]

1 hour ago, billh said:

That's as maybe , but that hardcore in the pictures is fresh crushed concrete put in recently, otherwise it would be black and mud covered.

 

Exactly this ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

There is absolutely no doubt looking at those pictures that most of what has caused the issue has been recently added.

But that was always a very fair assumption, given that 3 feet draughted boats could get easily along this pound without any issues before this "repair", but now it seems very much shallower draughted ones can't even manage it.

One expects contractors to try and do as little as possible - what is disappointing here is that nobody from CRT adequately checked the state of affairs before the water was put back.  Either they did, and were not clued up enough to see the inevitable, (or they didn't care!), or it simply was not done.  There can be no other explanation, can there?  It will clearly have cost far more to sort this out belatedly than it would have at the time.  It would be nice to think the contractors will pay, but somehow I doubt that.

Edited April 17, 2018 by alan_fincher

[Alan de Enfield]

[jonesthenuke]

So with a planned closure of the canal for 4 days, how much will they actually do?

Looks to me like they need to remove a lot of material.

 

 

 

[john6767]

8 minutes ago, jonesthenuke said:

So with a planned closure of the canal for 4 days, how much will they actually do?

Looks to me like they need to remove a lot of material.

You would think that right now they will only clear the central channel in the worst effected section, not sort out the general poor state.  I was expecting that they would have had some hoppers and a digger that could be offloaded grounded in the pound, but it seems not.  Whilst the towpath there is good, is it easy to get a digger there, my picturing of it is that  you are a fair bit above the A38.  Even with a digger there you have to cart away a fir bit of material as well.  So would be interesting to see how it is done.

[Alan de Enfield]

9 minutes ago, john6767 said:

 Even with a digger there you have to cart away a fir bit of material as well.  

I think it needs a bit more than just that tree branch removing.

(I am actually doubting if it is Fir)

Edited April 17, 2018 by Alan de Enfield

[kawaton]

Quality bit of towpath though.

Not that I would particularly want to walk it, as not the nicest/safest area. 

[Rob-M]

1 hour ago, kawaton said:

Quality bit of towpath though.

Not that I would particularly want to walk it, as not the nicest/safest area. 

Towpath was a problem when I grounded and had to get off the boat to flush some water down.  The only option was to put a line across the towpath to the fence so that when the boat was floating I had a means of pulling the bows over to get back on.  The cyclist that came hurtling along fortunately stopped when I waved him down to warn him of the line across the path.

[JamesWoolcock]

Hello all

I visited the Minworth site yesterday (Tuesday) on the advice of the of the Historic Narrow Boat Club (Where our boats can go, so can yours!) Navigations Officer who is also a member of the CRT Navigations Advisory Group (NAG) who said I should find CRT engineer Jane Marriott on site and I should talk to her. Jane was there to 'sort it out'. Her regular job is 'Programme Manager, Asset Improvement', so she'll never be stuck for anything to do then!

So I did and learnt a lot. She is very approachable, happy to share all her information and I think she listens.

The works here were overseen centrally by CRT not the local West Midlands Waterways Office, who have had the sticky end of the stick in sending out the Notices, email or otherwise, so some, including me, thought it was down to them. It isn't.

Kier are the contractors and as you will see it's not down to them either.

As I understand it the issues were to make a permanent repair to the troublesome embankment against the A38 trunk road into Birmingham, and to deal with multiple canal bed leakages just downstream of there.

The contractors did put a haul road down the drained canal as the first postings on this topic confirm with really good photographs..

And at the end of works Kier advised CRT that it must come out before rewatering.

However here lies the problem.

CRT had considered that the silt here was not of a hazardous status. It was. Surprise? And therefore the haul road material added was now also of a hazardous status,it having been added to the silt.

The cost of removal of the hazardous material was huge and therefore, against the advice of the contractors Kier, and not wishing to add to the already large cost of the contract, CRT decided to rewater with all the stone left in, the timber having been removed.

As you all know, boats will push through silt, even hazardous silt (!) but stone is different. They get stuck.

Jane Marriott tells me that they now know this was a great mistake from which they have now learnt. And can't apologise enough.

Whilst I was there Kier had a large machine back in the canal bed and were removing the now 'hazardous' stone, which will be very expensive to dispose of.

All round the very best of intentions but a great cock up nevertheless.

I must add that the site is embanked, and for a part on both sides of the navigation. This is the reason the silt was replaced against the wash walls to add stability as would be expected. A breach onto the A38 wouldn't just inconvenience us boaters! Besides, who wants to moor here? The depth at the Services further up is another issue but not unrelated. 

In short, CRT must consider all silt around the BCN, and probably many other former heavily industrialised areas, to be 'hazardous' and enjoy the bonus if it's found not to be. And make their original assessments based on this.

Kier the contractors appear not to be at fault at all.

Having had the passage out of Birmingham on the Birmingham & Fazeley denied to me 10 days ago, I am returning this way in the next few weeks. Ummmm. We shall see.

James

 

Edited April 19, 2018 by JamesWoolcock