Good afternoon,

Members of our team spent a sunny Saturday morning last weekend supporting a charity run organised by the people of Cotherstone. Monies raised were to be divided between Pancreatic Cancer Research and the North East Air Ambulance.

Following discussions with the organisers, we agreed to donate a digital clock/timer which they could use every year, as well as supplying and making available other items on loan, such as hi viz jackets for the marshals.  Our team members also both volunteered at the event and took part in the 5k run, along with their families.

The village of Cotherstone is very close to one of the shafts we’re sinking, to build the tunnel beneath the river Tees.  Community engagement activities such as this are a key part of the Farrans social value commitment, where we look to build a positive and trusting relationship with people and lasting impact in the areas where we work.

Kind regards

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon,

We’ll be installing temporary traffic lights on the B6277 opposite Lartington water treatment works, on Monday 31 July 2023.  This is so we can carry out preparatory work on this section of the road, ahead of the installation of the new pipeline which will eventually cross the road at this point.

We’ll be installing three-way traffic lights to keep road users, as well as our construction team safe, and we expect to be finished in five days, by Friday 4 August 2023.

We’ll be working as quickly and as safely as possible and thank people for their patience while this essential work is happening. 

If you’d like to speak to a member of our project team, you can telephone our customer contact centre on 0345 717 1100 or tweet us on @nwater_care and we will be very happy to help you.

Kind regards

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

There are points along the route of the new pipeline, running from Lartington to Shildon, where the pipe crosses roads. At these locations, or “access points”, we have to carefully plan how we’re going to work, taking into consideration both the safety of road users, the general public and our construction employees.

Between now and October 2023, we’ll be preparing all access points ready for the actual excavations and pipe installation that will commence later on in the project.

Our work at the first access point is going to start on Monday 24 July 2023 on the A688 at Stainton Grove, just to the north east of Barnard Castle (located at the red cross on the image below). We’ll be installing two-way traffic lights, which means we can avoid having a full road closure and can maintain the flow of traffic while we’re working here.  As there is also a footpath at this location, we’re also installing a light-controlled pedestrian crossing, to keep people safe while they’re using the footpath.

We expect to be finished here in five days, by Friday 28 July. We’ll be working as quickly and as safely as possible and thank people for their patience while this essential work is happening. 

If you’d like to speak to a member of our project team, you can telephone our customer contact centre on 0345 717 1100 or tweet us on @nwater_care and we will be very happy to help you.

Kind regards

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

We’re making good progress on the Project Pipeline: County Durham and Tees Valley contract. I’m delighted to tell you about this week’s milestone – our first consignment of pipes is being loaded into a ship in Turkey, which is due to set sail on Saturday 15^th July for the Port of Immingham. The journey will take around twelve days and the first pipes should arrive in the UK by Friday 28^th July 2023.

From Immingham, the pipes will be loaded onto standard-sized lorries for the last leg of their journey by road to our site. Approximately eight lorries per day will be transporting the pipes, taking the A1(M) north to Piercebridge and then heading west via the A67, to our Farrans main compound just to the east of Barnard Castle.  The route has been carefully planned to ensure it is suitable for the type of lorries being used and also so that we avoid causing excessive traffic through sensitive areas.

The pipes will then be stored at our compound, before being dispatched to the necessary locations along the pipeline route.

Kind regards

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

Friday, 23 June was International Women in Engineering Day (INWED). To mark the day, one of our senior engineers in Farrans, Carol Fleming shared her experiences to support other females in this role in a short interview

What made you pursue engineering as a career path?

I was interested in both Maths and Physics at school, so the route of engineering seemed the way to go. This also helped me to move into a career in the construction industry, as I enjoy problem solving and being hands-on.

What does a normal day in your role involve?

As a senior engineer, I’m heavily involved in managing subcontractors on site, along with appointing engineers to specific tasks. I help to programme the works within a lookahead plan, and assess and manage resources for specific tasks. I also liaise heavily with our client, Northumbrian Water, and landowners to help deliver a successful project that meets everyone’s expectations.

What’s it like being a woman in engineering?

It can be daunting in the beginning, when entering such a male-dominated industry. However, it’s becoming less of a taboo to see female engineers on site and everyone is more accepting of this. Everyone is generally very respectful on site and doesn’t judge you for being a female in the industry.

What advice would you give girls and women who are interested in becoming an engineer?

I would definitely encourage it.  The construction industry in general is a challenging one for anybody, but providing you have a strong drive for results and a passion to excel, you will do well.

How important is it to have women working in the engineering field?

I feel women can often provide a different perspective to some of the tasks and approach a situation in a different way, which can benefit the project and relation with various parties on site.

Have you seen any industry changes which have been for the better?

During my time working in the construction industry, I’ve witnessed a progression in the level of respect given to female engineers working on a male-dominated site and we are treated equal to our male colleagues. There’s also a great team within Farrans who you can turn to if you need support with any aspect of your career or day-to-day job.

What made you choose to work for Farrans?

Farrans is a well renowned company based in Northern Ireland and as a graduate I had attended careers fairs where Farrans stood out as a company who had a brilliant graduate training programme to offer.  I first joined Farrans as a student engineer in 2015, completing two summer placements and a year placement. I’ve now been with Farrans fully qualified for 4 years. I’ve progressed to Senior Engineer within the company and plan to progress further.  I enjoy the challenges I face and overcome throughout the working day. I also get a great sense of pride when I have contributed to the successful completion of a project. I find working in the construction industry very rewarding when a successful project has a positive impact on people’s lives.

A day in the life of an Archaeologist on the Durham and Tees valley Pipeline.

19 May 2023

Steve Collison, Archaeology Project Officer, ECUS

For an archaeologist working on a large infrastructure project like the Durham and Tees Valley  pipeline, no two days are ever the same. However, they all begin with a briefing from a Farrans site engineer, outlining everything we need to know about our operations for the day, any associated risks and details about other teams we might need to interact with. These daily briefings are essential for the smooth and safe running of the site, and to anticipate any potential difficulties.

Once work starts, the teams head up to the site. We are mechanically stripping topsoil and subsoil from a large area of suspected archaeology at a programme-critical location on the pipeline route. Our trained plant marshals monitor the strip, looking for signs of archaeological features and service trenches. They flag them up for investigation by other members of the team. It’s a demanding task, but the natural beauty of the surrounding area makes the job a little easier.

The surrounding countryside and farmland also remind me how important it is to minimise the environmental impact of our work; the environment is taken into account at all stages from planning to execution and final reinstatement – this approach ties in with Farrans’ commitments.

While some of the team monitor the soil strip, others are hand investigating the uncovered archaeological features. We are currently dealing with a mysterious ditch and a selection of pits. The ditch looks like nothing more than a 30m long stripe of discoloured soil within the subsoil. Yet to the trained eye of an archaeologist, it could reveal a wealth of information. We are in the middle of hand excavating slots through this ditch to understand how and when it was formed. From the way the deposits lie within the ditch we know it is not a recent feature, though a lack of any dating evidence, such as artefacts, make its age uncertain. It is probably part of a system of field boundaries related to nearby prehistoric settlement on the hill crest.

The pits offer slightly more evidence. One of them seems to be stone lined, and could have been used for storage. Andrew, the archaeologist investigating the feature, is rewarded with a small sherd of hand-made pottery of a type used for long periods before Roman conquest in the North, indicating that the features may relate to adjacent prehistoric settlement. While excavating, we take soil samples from the deposits we have excavated to gives us clues about what the environment was like while the features were formed and, possibly, some dating evidence in the form of charcoal that can be scientifically analysed to give us an estimate of its age.

It was a demanding yet rewarding day; significant progress was made in the soil stripping and we identified some evidence as to the nature of the archaeology we are investigating. Tomorrow will no doubt bring new challenges common to large infrastructure schemes, but with our shared commitment to safety, the environment, programme, and a job well done, I’m confident that we can keep ahead of pipeline construction.

#archaeology

#ecusarchaeology

#DayInTheLifeOfAnArchaeologist

#Archaeologist

#excavation

#blog

Good afternoon

I thought I’d share an example of some positive community engagement that happened this week. At our recent Meet the Contractor event, we spoke to Heidi Varley from Pink’s Flower Farm who told us the recent dry weather was threatening her crop of flowers. She asked whether there was any way Farrans could help. It was a simple task for us to arrange a visit with our water bowser to fill her empty tanks, but it meant a lot to Heidi. She explained

“It is our mission at Pink’s Flower Farm to grow cut flowers in Teesdale sustainably. We are completely off-grid and rely on natural weather to operate. Now in Year 5, we have seen dramatic changes to the weather since we’ve started. This year has been a challenge: an extremely wet spring saw us lose our entire spring tulip crop to a fungal disease that thrives on damp weather. Now we are facing a drought. We gather rainwater and water our beds using a solar powered pump system, but our tanks ran dry last week. We cannot thank NWL and Farrans Construction enough for coming to our rescue. They have replenished our water tanks and given our flower beds a fantastic drink! Forever grateful.”

Steve Coates, Farrans Project Manager, said,

“We’re always looking for meaningful ways to engage with people in the communities where we work. We met Heidi at our Meet the Contractor event on 5 June, where she explained the water supplies at her flower farm were running low. We use a water bowser on site for dust suppression, so it was relatively easy for us to step in and refill Heidi’s water tanks. We’re going to be working in the area for the next two years, delivering the Project Pipeline: County Durham to Tees Valley on behalf of Northumbrian Water, and we hope we can support many other local projects during this time.”

Have a lovely weekend.

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

Yesterday, I spent a very interesting and rewarding afternoon with colleagues from Farrans as well as Northumbrian Water, at our Meet the Contractor event, which we held in Cotherstone Village Hall.  We held the event to introduce ourselves to a range of stakeholders including residents, community groups and local business. We spent time explaining the details of the pipeline we’re constructing and also listening to great ideas people were putting forward about community events we could support, as part of our social value delivery over the next two years. Around fifty people attended, and we received some great feedback on our evaluation sheets, with comments such as, “Very interesting and informative”, “Useful to meet the team and find out about the work”, “Thank you for reaching out to the community. A very helpful exercise”.

Over the next week or so, I’ll be working with our Farrans Project Manager, Steve Coates, to look at the requests for community engagement and support we’ve received and see how Farrans can help.  If you have a project to put forward for consideration, please scan the QR code below to put the details in a short questionnaire – this QR will be live until Friday 9 June.

Many thanks,

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

On 22 May 2023, we started to work on a vital part of Project Pipeline: County Durham and Tees Valley, the crossing of the River Tees at Cotherstone, near Barnard Castle. 

To get the new pipeline across the river, we’re sinking shafts on the east and west banks and then tunneling 12 meters underneath the River Tees. The first shaft we’re constructing is on the west bank of the river near Cotherstone. This will be sunk to a depth of 34 meters and it will take us around 80 days to complete.  This week, we’ll also be commencing the east shaft which will go down to a depth of 48 meters and take approximately 100 days to build. Once the west shaft is complete, we’ll start to drill a tunnel linking the two shafts, 220m long and 1.8m in diameter. We’re expecting to complete the Tees crossing by early 2024, ready for us to install the duel 700mm diameter steel pipelines down the shafts and through the tunnel.

Our highly trained and skilled team of specialists are carrying out this work, following rigorous health and safety procedures. We also have noise and vibration monitoring in place, although we do not expect any measurements to exceed agreed tolerance levels.

Many thanks,

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner

Good afternoon

As part of our contract, Farrans is committed to delivering a range of social and economic activity to benefit the community.  Last week, I thoroughly enjoyed attending two engagement sessions at a local college and school.

The first of these was at South West Durham Training where my colleague Carol Fleming and I talked to their engineering students. We explained about the work we were doing in Durham on behalf of Northumbrian Water, plus other civil engineering schemes delivered elsewhere by Farrans.  Carol went on to talk about her own experiences as a senior engineer, her personal background and how she became qualified – she was very inspirational.  That's Carol on the right of the photo in the yellow jumper.

My second session was at The Oaks special needs school in Spennymoor. I was invited by Durham Works to be a Business Ambassador in a ‘Speed Networking’ event, where pupils from Year 10 had to “Guess My Job”. We all spent a lively 2 hours working with lots of small groups, who each quizzed us for 10 minutes before trying to guess our roles. I took along my hard hat, hi-viz jacket and ear defenders as a clue to my sector, which they all really enjoyed trying on!

I’m looking forward to doing many more of these sessions with schools over the coming months, helping to inspire our young people to be the civil engineers of the future.

Many thanks,

Karen Alexander

Farrans’ Community Business Partner