Hi everyone

Some of you may have noticed our team out on site on Wednesday this week with the piling contractor Bullivants. They have now submitted their design to Stantec and this will be incorporated into the overall plan.

We continue to work with NCC around the Application in Principle and the Environment Agency for the permit we need to work in the river and to maintain our environmental obligations.

I'm hopeful that we will be able to confirm a start date for the work and the program of works when we have our next public meeting which I think is being arranged for Friday 30th April.

Have a great weekend

Rachel

Good afternoon everyone

A few things to update on this week:

The stray dumpy bags were removed from the river this week by our supply partners.

The piling contractors (Bullivant's) have finalised the design for the piling work that needs to be carried out to support the back lane. This will be re-submitted in the Application in Principle to the council.

Stantec are working on the design to tie-in the existing wall to the piles.

We have been working with your local councillors to try and get an update on the traffic and also confirm the date for the next meeting which will be on either Friday 23rd or 30th April.

Have a great weekend.

Kind regards

Rachel

Good evening everyone

We are still waiting for a date for Bullivant's who are our piling contractors to be able to start the work to secure the back lane before we repair the wall. I'm hopeful that this will be available within the next week. As soon as we have a date confirmed, I will formally write to everyone affected to let you know the next steps.

Changes to the Application in Principle to reflect the piling work will be submitted to NCC next week.

We have had confirmation that the site compound can be located on the land near the entrance to the allotments which is good news.

Kind regards

Rachel

Good afternoon everyone

Thanks to those of you who could make it to the meeting last week. As requested, we will try and arrange for the next meeting to be later in the day so more of you can attend.

As you know, two more boreholes were taken in the back lane last Friday and these confirmed that the ground conditions mean that we will have to use sheet piling to support the back lane.

We are waiting for our piling contractor to confirm dates of when they are available and as soon as we have dates we will share them with you.

I will be writing to everyone with a full update once the dates are confirmed.

Kind regards

Rachel

Good Morning everyone

I just wanted to let you know that there will be some more activity in the back lane this morning as our contractors will be on site to take a further borehole sample.

For those of you who can make it - we'll see you at 11.

Thanks

Rachel

Good afternoon everyone

I just wanted to start with a 'Thank you' for your co-operation earlier in the week when we were on site carrying out the boreholes. We managed to complete the work we wanted to and the samples that were taken out of the ground are now being analysed. This will help determine the final detail of the work to rebuild the wall.

Our next update meeting has been confirmed for next Friday, 12th March at 11am. I'm sure your local councillors will pass on the joining instructions. Our project team will be on hand again to provide updates about what has been happening behind the scenes and also let you know what needs to happen now to enable us to get on site and start the work.

Have a lovely weekend.

Rachel

Hi everyone

Just to confim the we will be on site on Monday morning to drill the two boreholes at either end of the fenced off area. If you could make sure that our contractors have access to the back lane from 8am that would be great. We will be installing vibration monitoring equipment before this work starts. The property survey reports from Sanderson Weatherall should have been hand delivered to you this afternoon.

We are hoping to have the next meeting in two weeks so we can update you on our progress and give you and update on where we are at with our discussions with NCC about parking during the main project.

Kind regards

Rachel

Hello Everyone

Just a quick update from me today.

I’m standing in for Rachel to let you know that on Monday 22 February our Estates team will be posting formal notices in the back lane with notification that the boreholes are to commence.

We are continuing to work towards the schedule that Rachel has already shared, and she’ll be back next week to provide you with a further update on that timetable.

Kind regards

Amanda

Good afternoon

I wanted to provide you with an update about what’s been happening this week and provide a plan of what we will be working on moving forward to get us to the point of starting on the ground.

This week, we have had confirmation that we don’t need planning permission to rebuild the wall which is good news. We have had verbal agreement to the Approval In Principle from NCC which allows us to progress the design and firm up the drawings.

The property surveys are almost complete and we propose to carry out the boreholes week commencing 1st March.  

Our Estates team will be posting formal notices in the back lane to inform you that the boreholes are to commence. This is a legal requirement.

 The Environment Agency have confirmed that there is no need for Water Framework Directive Assessment as we are not altering the watercourse, again this is good news.

Following our meeting on 29th January, as promised, we approached Newcastle City Council about alternative parking and they have confirmed that they won’t allow the use of either the bus lane or the cycle lane for safety reasons. They are also unable to approve the installation of a mirror to aid visibility when exiting the back lane. They have taken away the request to reduce the speed limit however have pointed out this would be a legal process and may take some time. I’m sure this is disappointing and we would welcome any further suggestions for how these issues might be addressed. We are also speaking to local councillors about alternative approaches.

We will be inspecting the dumpy bags and the fencing on a weekly basis moving forward.

Plan of our next steps:

As I mentioned above, we will be doing the two boreholes 1st March . The analysis of the samples will then be carried out and this will feed into the detailed design.

On-going - finalise structural  surveys which are almost completed – Sanderson Weatherall will then produce the reports for each property

w/c 15th February - submit Flood Risk Activity Permit Application to the Environment Agency

w/c 8th March – Esh Stantec will be finalizing the detailed design of the required work

8th March – 31st March - prepare contract documentation, finalize costs, obtain approvals & formally award the contract to Esh Stantec

1st April – 19th April -  progress health and safety planning, procure the required materials to enable us to  commence construction.

We will update you on this in future weeks so you know how we are progressing with that timetable.

Kind regards

Rachel

Good afternoon everyone

I wanted to provide an update about what has happened over the last week and let you know what are plans are for the coming week.

As you know, the river levels have been high this week and we have placed sandbags at the location of the damaged wall section to provide extra protection. As more rain is forecasted, we will continue to monitor the situation.

A number of you have already had your properties surveyed by Sanderson Weatherall and more are booked in next week. Sanderson Weatherall have left messages and written to some properties who have not yet had a survey and I would encourage you to make an appointment as soon as possible to we can progress with the boreholes.

Next week, we will continue to liaise with Newcastle City Council about our plans for the work and Ben Ralston who you met last Friday is continuing to work with our ecologist to gather the information we need in support of our application to the Environment Agency.

As requested during the meeting last week, we are pulling together a forward plan so that we can share what will be happening over the coming weeks as we work towards starting work on site. This will be posted on this portal by close of play on Thursday 11th February.

Thanks

Rachel