Portsmouth Demolition & Salvages management team comprised a detailed health safety & environmental management plan to ensure the demolition of the bridge could be carried out safely while causing minimal disruption to the local area & ensuring no environmental impact was caused. 

Prior to works commencing on the site baseline monitoring had to be carried out & recorded for noise, dust & vibration to establish the ambient levels within the surrounding area, which would be cross referenced with further monitoring carried out during the works to ensure the demolition of the bridge did not cause disturbance and/or excessive levels to the Old Station Tea Rooms, local residents & business including the adjacent new bridge structure. 

 

All plant & equipment prior to arriving on site had to be steamed cleaned to ensure no foreign mater & debris contaminated the sensitive ecological area, all fuel for the plant & equipment was stored in a secure double bunged bowser & dispensed via electric pumps. Drip trays & spill kits were provided during refuelling & to the underside of the plant while stationary & out of the working hours to ensure fuels, oils etc did not contaminate the grounds. 

 

Ground protection was placed to the underside of the bridge on the road & the embankments in the form of crushed materials on the tarmac road surface & Terram on the embankments to protect the road from damage & ensure lead base paint debris from the bridge did not contaminate the surrounding grounds. Dust suppression was carried to control the dust produced during the demolition works as required to by means of an operative spaying a fine mist of water over the works area using a jet wash bowser, the dampening down was continuously monitored to ensure no excessive water run off occurred. 

 

A detailed traffic & waste management plan was derived, as a requirement placed on the project was no stockpiling of waste materials from the works to minimise the risk of contaminating the surrounding environment. All concrete broken out from the road surface of the bridge was loaded directly into pre-arranged lorries & all steel cut down from the bridge was placed directly into roll-on-off container at the time of removal to contain the lead paint debris from the bridge during the removal process. 

 

Due to necessary road closure which had to be implemented both to carry out the demolition works & the building of the new bridge, both works had to be caried out adjacent to each other & within a restricted programme. The demolition of the bridge was carried out over 14 consecutive days to minimise the disruption to the local residents, businesses & ensure the finalisation of the building works on the new bridge could be completed in time for its opening. This required the pre planning of waste transport, delivery & collection of plant & machinery, fuels & relief personnel for out of standard working hours to ensure the works were completed on target. 

 

Once all the bridge removal works had been completed, the ground protection which had been place on the road surface & embankments was carefully removed from site as controlled waste & the grounds around the works area were tested for contamination from the works. 

 

All works were carried out within the programmed duration & without any incidents or accidents & to the clients satisfaction.