Project Engineer
Network Rail
Total years of experience :18 years, 6 Months
As part of Thameslink Programme - London Bridge Station Redevelopment I participate in construction phase of Bermondsey Dive-Under Scheme (BDU, project value: £65M) and GRIP Stage 4-8 (design and construction phase) of Structures Strengthening Project.
The BDU scheme entails the realignment of the South Eastern, South Central (Sussex) and South London lines between Rotherhithe New Road to the east and the East London line to the west to provide grade separation between the South Central fast lines and the South Eastern and South London routes. The grade separation will minimise the conflicting crossing moves on the eastern approach to London Bridge. This is achieved by raising the vertical alignment of the South Central fast lines, while in turn lowering the vertical alignment of the four South Eastern, South Central slow and South London lines to dive under the South Central fast lines.
The construction includes:
Demolition of existing masonry viaducts and metalic underline bridges
Building of dive-under concrete box structure
Building of reinforced earth, precast arch viaduct and composite bridge forming approach ramps to the dive-under structure and extension to existing viaduct.
Installation of prefabricated composite bridge deck, encased in concrete bridge deck and concrete half through bridge deck
Building of New drainage network around the site
In addition to the dive under construction, the project is strengthening a number of structures to meet Network Rail’s aspirations for the route.
My primary responsibility involves:
Implement Network Rail systems and procedures to maintain a cost effective, high quality, safe and environmentally responsible approach to design, construction, commissioning and other technical activities on projects, compliant with all relevant legislation. Liaise with regulators and others as appropriate.
Monitor the projects managed so that they are engineered to the standards and specification of Network Rail, allocated design and construction contracts include reference to and are compliant with appropriate Railway Group and Network Rail Company standards, formal specifications and procedures.
Manage all engineering activities so that they result in schemes that are affordable and meet programme requirements in a safe and environmentally responsible manner for time, cost and quality.
Maintain the use of relevant techniques and procedures of quantified and qualitative risk assessment and HAZOP analysis to allocated projects and manage the environmental aspects of allocated projects in accordance with Network Rail’s environmental policy.
Monitoring design and specialist consultants and contractors, providing project management advice in respect of all construction activities, including testing and commissioning and site supervision.
Managing design and construction elements of the projects to meet the requirements of current legislation, including construction design management regulations.
Arranging an audit of contractors to monitor safety, environment and quality of design, construction and testing.
Providing quality assurance - design review, Non-Conformance Report review, Inspection and Test Plan review, and dealing with site queries
Contributing to project coordination - arranging Inter-Disciplinary Check and Record
Working as part of Network Operations which plans, operates and maintains the UK railway day-to-day, I participate in Asset Management for Sussex Route, which draws out the capability of structures from Victoria to Brighton within the Sussex Route. This typically involves:
Schedule examinations, inspections, monitoring and assessment of structures assets and the evaluation of the reports in accordance with functional policy, systems and standards. Implement mitigation measures where proposed management actions are deferred.
Specify and prioritise actions to address defects, comments and other issues raised in the reports, in accordance with standards and functional policy, for inclusion in work plans. Oversee the development, implementation and handover of prioritised work items to realise the required outputs. Produce route specific and asset type management regimes, and progress mitigations if items are deferred.
Undertake engineering analysis and risk assessments of assets or asset components to support the asset management process and scheme development, including business cases and whole life cost analysis.
Monitor and evaluate asset condition and capability trend data, and failure precursors to inform examination, maintenance, strengthening, risk mitigation and renewal plans to efficiently achieve corporate objectives.
Provide support to the specification and development of enhancement schemes and manage the interface with network capability programmes.
Liaise with the central structures team to develop and disseminate consistent best practice and in the review and development of functional policy and standards.
Determine mitigation actions necessary to reduce the impact of adverse weather on the performance of structures assets.
Maintain structures asset data and information within the company systems and processes.
Support the review and development of national standards relating to structures Asset Management.
Support initiatives to develop the buildings & civils strategic direction and input to the CP5 bid process in the route and supporting negotiations with regulatory bodies.
Provide engineering support and participate in investigations of incidents relating to structures.
Review proposals from other disciplines or external organisations that could impact on the route structures assets and/or programmes of work to identify potential synergies or conflicts.
Support the process for the review and approval of abnormal vehicular and rail loads.
Control the technical development of projects, ascertaining that renewal requirements are sufficient, correctly interpreted and any changes are agreed with Route Asset Manager. Assist with the approval in principle of designs and manage acceptance of detailed design certification.
Actively worked on M1 Junction 19 Improvement Detailed Design to Eurocodes, mainly contributing to A14-M1 Northbound Link Flyover, six span steel composite bridge.
Finite Element Analysis of bridge superstructure using LUSAS
Producing design parameters to Eurocodes (BS EN 1991)
Bearing design to Eurocodes (BS EN 1337-8)
Soil-structure interaction analysis for pile design (PIGLET)
Check on AutoCAD drawings
Experienced in structural assessment and design of concrete and steel structures using BS 5400, DMRB, Network Rail Standards, and Eurocode. Also experienced in principal inspections on steel and concrete bridges.
Key skills gained:
Project Management
Bid preparation
CDM Designer’s Risk Assessment
Preparation / review of Approval in Principle documents
Preparation / review of Method Statement / Work Package Plan and Risk Assessment
Preparation of scheme contract document and health and safety file
Bridge analysis skills - frame analysis, grillage analysis, and finite element analysis (FEA)
Use of structural analysis software - SuperStress, LUSAS, and SAM
Inspection and assessment of highway and railway structures
Concrete and steel design BS 5400, DMRB, Network Rail Standards, and Eurocodes.
PTS trained
Planning of transport and storage requirements for ammunition. This involved ensuring that all the correct vehicles and magazines were readily available and to ensure that all ammunition was kept safe and accounted for at all times. In addition, regular inspection to magazines was carried out.
The course comprises of 120 credits of taught modules and 60 credits of dissertation. The taught modules include: Fire Engineering, Structural Dynamics and Stability, Research Methodology, Advanced Theory of Structures, Research Literature Review, Reinforced Concrete Structures, Earthquake Engineering, and Steel Structures. During the course I also entered Student Design Competition held by Concrete Centre. I won university prize for the competition.
Well balanced course spanning all civil engineering first principles and practicality. It covered structural engineering, water engineering, geotechnical engineering and survey.