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Anchor Landmark, the dry build segmental retaining wall system manufactured by Acheson & Glover, is being used in a major road infrastructure project, for the first time in the UK and Ireland
The innovative product features in the £104 million design, build, finance and operate (DBFO) contract for the Westlink and M1 upgrade being undertaken by main contractor, Highway Management Construction (HMC) for the Northern Ireland Department for Regional Development’s Road Service.
HMC decided to incorporate a reinforced earth structure in the project’s early planning stages. Lead project designer Arup then worked with Maccaferri Ltd - Acheson and Glover’s engineering partner, and sole distributor of the Anchor system - to come up with the Anchor Landmark solution. It holds BBA Roads & Bridges accreditation and has been approved by Northern Ireland’s Road Service for use in structures requiring TAS approval.
HMC has begun work on the retaining walls at the Stockman’s Lane junction where the motorway is being widened through the construction of two new bridges. To date, two walls have been built at the junction’s city-bound on and off slip roads. The structures have been designed to hold up widened and heightened embankments while at the same time maintaining the original height of the existing slip roads.
Each is approximately 150 metres in length and up to 4 metres tall. Two further walls are to be built on the country-bound slip roads once a new bridge - currently under construction - is completed next year.
The retaining walls were designed with the specific purpose of addressing two key issues.
First, speed of construction was vital because the project is located on a main arterial route and most of the work involved had to be undertaken at night. Second, ground works on the congested site had to be kept to a minimum so that the existing slip roads could be kept open during the widening scheme.
An additional factor in the product’s selection is the attractive range of colours available and the split face texture which complements the scheme’s overall aesthetic qualities.
The choice of the Anchor segmental retaining wall system means that the excavation work required to build it has been kept to a minimum. A 250mm deep trench filled with a layer of compacted stone was all that was needed as a foundation in each of the two completed walls.
Behind the walls, a strip just 3.5 metres wide was excavated to accommodate Enkagrid Pro geosynthetic reinforcement and backfill which work together with the Landmark facing blocks to form a highly efficient engineered retaining wall.
HMC staff responsible for building the walls required only a half-day training following which, a five-man squad was able to complete sections of up to 20m2 in a single day.
According to A&G’s business development manager, Paddy Devlin, the use of Anchor in the Westlink is attracting a lot of interest from construction industry firms throughout the UK and Ireland.
“Anchor Landmark is produced to the highest standards in a specially commissioned BBA approved facility.
“Its speed of installation and associated cost savings make it a very attractive product for the large number of infrastructure projects currently underway throughout these islands,” he adds.
