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DfT Plan to Demolish Disused Bridges and Tunnels

Ashley Hill

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RAIL magazine #935 p. 17 has an item saying HE has offered to remove its concrete infill under the bridge at Great Musgrave, Cumbria, free of charge, if it's ever required to reinstate a line under it.
Id imagine this is a sop to the press given the bad publicity this has generated amongst the railway community. Come any proposed reinstatement of the line no doubt HE will come up with 10 reasons why the removal of the concrete can't be done.
 
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snowball

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Coincidentally, while looking for something else on the Commons Transport Committee website, I came across this correspondence which relates to this thread.


Sample quotes from long letter

Baroness Vere of Norbiton
Minister for Roads, Buses and Places

Huw Merriman MP
Chair of the Transport Committee
House of Commons

7 July 2021

Dear Huw,

Historical Railways Estate

Thank you for your letter of 16 June 2021 about the Historical Railways Estate

For your ease of reference, I have quoted in bold italics below the relevant sections of your
letter to which my response relates.

In 2016, Highways England stated its aim was to demolish 10-15% of the estate,
subject to securing the necessary funding. We would be grateful if you could
confirm whether this target remains in place, and, if not, whether any revised target
for demolition exists.


Highways England’s primary concern is the safety of the public. Noting the Committee’s
previous recommendations on this issue, Highways England’s approach is to transfer
responsibility of HRE structures so they can be repurposed and reused to support walking,
cycling or new heritage railway lines wherever possible. Where this is not possible, they
will be maintained and kept safe, sometimes by infilling. As outlined in my previous letter,
infilling is reversible.

Highways England will only demolish as a last resort. It has confirmed to me that it has no
target or aim to demolish any percentage of the HRE and will only look to do this where it
is necessary on safety grounds.

The suggestion that Highways England has an aim to demolish 10-15% of the HRE may
have arisen from a strategy and options discussion paper that was put forward to DfT
during dialogue over management of the Estate. As you know, such papers consider all
options, including a do minimum or do-nothing approach. I welcome the rigour that this
exploratory approach brings to any discussion. That paper highlights that 10-15% of the
estate could be demolished if there was no interest in them from other parties. It does not
state that this is the preferred option.

You told us 17 infilling schemes have been paused or adapted. We would like to
know why this was necessary when you told us Highways England “would not enter
a phase of works without clarity over the aspirations for potential re-use.”


Highways England was unaware of the local aspirations to repurpose and reuse the 17
structures. It sought consent under permitted development rights to undertake
maintenance to keep them safe. Upon receipt of feedback from those local planning
authorities regarding their future aspirations for these structures, it paused or adapted
schemes so that it could explore and, where possible, support these plans. We believe this
is the right approach, listening in the cases where there may be other viable aspirations for
these structures of which we were previously unaware.

We were pleased to read in the press that the number of bridges threatened with
infilling has been reduced from 115 to 69. We would be grateful if you could confirm
the basis upon which 46 bridges have been reprieved, given that Highways
England’s infilling programme was based on a risk assessment by expert engineers
and structures are only proposed for infilling if they are “unsafe”.


Highways England shared a list of 115 schemes that were in various stages of
development for maintenance in the interests of public safety. This list was released in
response to a freedom of Information request in December 20. In that list they highlighted
schemes that were the subject of potential infilling about which they had written to local
authorities. Suitable schemes for 46 bridges from that list are still under development and
will be shaped by any feedback Highways England receive regarding future plans to re-
purpose or re-use these structures.

We have been informed that Highways England is now routinely refusing to provide
any information to members of the public about the ongoing infilling and demolition
programme. We are concerned this may prevent community groups and other
interested parties from making representations about structures of importance to
them, particularly if no planning application has been submitted.


Highways England welcomes interest in the Historical Railways Estate and strives to be
open and honest about its plans and aspirations.

They have received unusually high volumes of freedom of information requests for
structural assessment reports. Before such reports can be shared, they have to be
reviewed to redact personal details. This has resulted in a significant amount of work and
some requests have had to be refused given the staff time required to deal with them, as
set out within the bounds of Freedom of Information legislation.

To address this and ensure transparency, Highways England has recently launched a
Historical Railway Estate page on its website. From August 2021, this web page will also
house an archive which will be used to make assessment reports publicly available using a
phased approach to publication to make this exercise manageable. I hope that this step is
another sign of Highways England’s constructive approach to its management of the
Estate.

We have also been informed that there has been no dialogue with officers from
either the Eden Valley or Stainmore railways about this bridge. We would be grateful
if you could confirm the extent of Highways England’s engagement with these two
important stakeholders.


Regarding the heritage railway companies, Highways England discussed the former
branch line with both Eden Valley Railway and Stainmore Railway. They had both raised
their long-term aspirations to connect their operations and provide a rail link between
Kirkby Stephen and Appleby-in-Westmoreland; however, it would be a heritage railway as
both towns are already connected by the Settle to Carlisle line operated by Network Rail.
Highways England welcomed these discussions. Both heritage railway companies readily
acknowledge the significant hurdles to overcome in the form of missing bridges, including
crossing the River Eden, land ownership, and Transport and Works Act Orders. Their
conclusion was that a connection, if it ever happened, was a long-term future aspiration.
They acknowledged that the additional impact of reversing the infilling of one bridge in
comparison to the other works required was negligible.

I appreciate the strong interest in this bridge, and it is important for me to note the many
views about this case, which I and my colleagues at Highways England respect. As you
would expect, beyond the heritage railway organisations Highways England has taken an
inclusive and sympathetic approach at Great Musgrave. They have gone to great lengths
to correct several inaccurate reports about their approach to this issue. I appreciate the
opportunity to do the same here.

In April 2020, it advised Eden District Council (EDC) of its intention to undertake infilling
work, to which the Council expressed no objection and confirmed that it would not require
a planning application. In June 2021, EDC asked Highways England for more information
regarding the work and it provided the reports and details, as requested. The bridge had
been assessed as being unsafe due to it having no weight restriction applied. A weight
limit is the responsibility of the local highways authority, in this case Cumbria County
Council. Furthermore, Highways England speak regularly to its counterparts in the bridges
team at Cumbria County Council and discussed with them as well as officers at EDC prior
to any work taking place.

As you would expect, Highways England also spoke to Sustrans, Railway Paths Limited
and the Railway Heritage Trust. They received no objections from any of these important
stakeholder groups before works began. Furthermore, as I set out below, Highways
England has also made a commitment to reverse the infilling at no cost should a feasible
heritage railway line start work and require the connection at Great Musgrave.

We have been informed that Highways England twice refused Eden District
Council’s request to pause works at the Cumbria bridge, despite not having
planning permission. We would like to know why infilling continued in these
circumstances and why the bridge presented an urgent risk to public safety.


Highways England proceeded based on advice given by Eden District Council (EDC) that
planning permission was not required. EDC then contacted Highways England once work
had started. When work to make the bridge safe was substantially complete, EDC
recommended that Highways England stop in order that they could conduct a more
thorough analysis of the work to re-check whether it qualified to be undertaken under
permitted development, that is without planning permission.

The context here is that the need to start work on the bridge was urgent. The structure was
weak, potentially causing the bridge deck to fall suddenly. A delay would have resulted in a
project delay to 2022 due to ecological constraints on construction, owing to the presence
of bats. Given the urgency, Highways England made the decision to proceed on the
grounds of public safety, it acted on the advice that EDC had given it, and the work was
progressed to a stage where a pause was no longer possible.

Moreover, Highways England has taken the pragmatic step of committing to reversing the
infilling at no cost should a realistic prospect of a heritage railway start work.

I am grateful to you and the Committee for your interest in the Estate, and in ensuring that
Highways England is acting properly in its management of it.

BARONESS VERE OF NORBITON
 

infobleep

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Annetts key

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A weight limit is the responsibility of the local highways authority.
Interesting, considering that not all road over railway bridges are owned by the local authority, Highways England or any railway company. I know of one road over railway bridge (in use for both road and rail traffic) that is owned apparently by the Ministry of Defence.

Now, if Highways England inspected the bridge and came to the conclusion that there was a safety issue, why did they not immediately contact the local highways authority and suggest either a weight limit be imposed or the bridge be closed to traffic.

When Network Rail discovers that an operational road over rail, or rail over road bridge has been damaged or has suffered possible structural problems, they take action. Including emergency temporary closure.

Hence I don’t buy the explanation that the infill work was urgent. Is it likely that the reason it was urgent was so the contractor could get it done before any objections were received?

I wonder when Cumbria County Council last inspected the bridge. And if it did not see a need to impose a weight restriction, what it’s structure engineer said about it?

The reason that many of these structures are in a poor condition is because they have not been and are not being maintained. Either at all, or only the bare minimum work is being done. If proper maintenance and repair work was carried out, the stone and brick structures may last another fifty to one hundred years or more.

For metal bridges the situation is rather more complex, as there can be hidden corrosion.
 

Dr Hoo

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The reason that many of these structures are in a poor condition is because they have not been and are not being maintained. Either at all, or only the bare minimum work is being done. If proper maintenance and repair work was carried out, the stone and brick structures may last another fifty to one hundred years or more.
For a typical 'Beeching closure' type of redundant structure I suspect that there has already been around 50 years of, ahem, 'light' maintenance attention mostly when it was a BR Property Board responsibility. The state of fencing, drainage, vegetation, fly tipping and so forth hardly gives the impression that abandoned routes still in public ownership have been lovingly conserved in many cases.
 

snowball

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There was an item about this just now on BBC Radio 4 "PM", in the closing minutes of the programme, about 17:55. It will no doubt be on the web shortly.
 

infobleep

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Radio 4 PM - as mentioned above at 54:13

Here's the link to the New Civil Engineer magazine article that PM refers to.

More from the same magazine

Rumours that Segovia are planning to implement the 'Great Musgrave solution' to cut maintenance costs on their aqueduct have been denied...

View attachment 99924
I note Highways England don't put up a decent counterargument as to why. David Kitching, managing director of Goldhawk Bridge Restoration Ltd managing is wrong when he told NCE that “infilling historic bridges is so unnecessary”.

Is that because they weren't told about Shat Mr Kitching said or they can't answer because he's right?

This is what the article says about the MARS process Goldhawk Bridge Restoration Ltd use.
The company’s Masonry Arch Repair and Strengthening (MARS) system has been rolled out on more than 300 railway and highway bridges across the country – many much larger than the Great Musgrove structure.

The solution involves the installation of a reinforcement system which consists of stainless steel bars, installed into raked slot in the soffit of the arch.
 

snowball

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The Guardian:


The government’s roads agency could be forced to remove hundreds of tonnes of concrete it used to fill in a Victorian railway arch in a project that was condemned as the first act of “cultural vandalism” in a nationwide plan.

Eden district council told Highways England (HE) this week that it needs to apply for retrospective planning permission for a scheme that involved pouring an estimated 1,000 tonnes of concrete and aggregate under the bridge at Great Musgrave, Cumbria, at the start of nationwide programme to infill scores of historic structures.

If planning is refused, the agency will be obliged to restore the bridge to its state before the infill began at the end of May.
 

WesternLancer

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The Guardian:

If they have to apply for planning permission like that then that is open to public objections, from anyone, anywhere. That may not change the outcome, but a lot of formal objections (usually easy to do on line) would raise the profile of the issue
eg here

I'd certainly be of the view the method used to infill was 'out of character' for the area it is in. As well as the grounds given under 'principle'
We will only consider comments or objections that are 'material' and relevant to planning, for example:

  • Principle - If you feel that the very nature of the proposal is inappropriate and that the use of land/property should not change.
  • Overlooking - The proposal would lead to previously private areas being overlooked.
  • Overshadowing - The height or proximity of the development would be such that unreasonable overshadowing would occur.
  • Disturbance - There would be unacceptable intrusion in the form of noise nuisance, general disturbance, odour, and so on.
  • Overbearing - The scale of the works means that the property/premises has an oppressive impact on surrounding areas/houses.
  • Out of character - If the design of the development, its scale and use, is such that it appears to be out of character with its surroundings.
  • Road Safety - The development may lead to a significant impact upon road safety.
 

snowball

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Item just starting on BBC2 Newsnight, around 23:12 BST.
 
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BrianW

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I feel my hackles rising- these bumbling idiots, unthinking, unfeeling, useless ullages ...

BUT- surely all the right considerations will be made, and seem to have been. Risks, likelihoods, ameliorations, diversions, costs, politics, what ifs ....
Of course you or I might reach a different conclusion when applying different criteria or weightings or evaluating differently ...

Might monitoring and prediction technology make a useful contribution here, recognising how the landslide near Stonehaven and others have given impetus? Continuous measurement must be possible, and cheaper than periodic inspection, and reliable?
 

XAM2175

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Of course you or I might reach a different conclusion when applying different criteria or weightings or evaluating differently ...

Might monitoring and prediction technology make a useful contribution here, recognising how the landslide near Stonehaven and others have given impetus? Continuous measurement must be possible, and cheaper than periodic inspection, and reliable?
It's fairly obvious, I think, that the DfT view most of these structures as little more than problems that it would really rather not have to deal with - considering that the Historical Railways Estate is effectively the very last dregs of BR's property book, having already been picked over by Railtrack, Network Rail, and most recently by London and Continental Railways, which acquired anything that they thought had any reasonable commercial potential back in 2013 when BRB (Residuary) Ltd was wound up.

Indeed it's already been noted by other posters that the Highways England mandate for the HRE doesn't really require them to do anything other than minimise the DfT's exposure to liability, so it wouldn't surprise me if they were taking the long view - as we so often ask them to, ironically - as spending big now in order to save spending in the future.
 

DJ_K666

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Concrete can be poured in one go then left to set. Packed earth would require a much longer operation to compact each layer, and would likely be difficult once close to the top of the arch. Also, trucking in a load of soil from elsewhere can have very harmful local effects on the environment. However in many cases total demolition, packed earth and then a wider road on top would be far more beneficial than any attempt to retain the bridge, even if it did mean 1 week closure rather than 1 day.

It would be nice to see a concrete block covered in a shallow layer of soil though.
Of course if a landowner refuses the contractors access to his land then they'd have to go through some kind of planning process. Failing that there's always the old 'Tip-a-sack-of-sugar-into-the-wet-concrete'* trick once they've gone. I'd certainly be more than annoyed if I was that farmer and might consider reporting them for fly tipping.

*Allegedly stops the chemical reaction that causes concrete to harden. It was what they used when that concrete incident happened on the Victoria Line

I suppose though, even if it is 'foamed' concrete and thus can be 'reamed out', presumably any preserved railway wanting to run under the Great Musgrave bridge would not want to bore a single circular hole through it, as, unless the bridge were built excessively high, in order to get a train through they'd need to remove the concrete right up to the underside of the original stone bridge, and would need a rectangular hole.

And for aesthetic reasons, they'd clearly want to remove the whole lot.

Would that be possible though, or will the concrete have stuck itself so tightly to the stone that removing it would tear apart the original stonework?
HE said if a line reopens they'd remove it free of charge. I'd hold them to that since I am more than just a little sceptical.

A coup by a concrete salesman ...
Probably one who moonlights for Jacobs
 
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Pigeon

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Concrete can be poured in one go then left to set. Packed earth would require a much longer operation to compact each layer, and would likely be difficult once close to the top of the arch. Also, trucking in a load of soil from elsewhere can have very harmful local effects on the environment.

It doesn't have to be pure soil all the way through though; the inside can be all kinds of gubbins you've dug out of some hole elsewhere and now need to find somewhere to put it. And concrete is rotten for the environment on a global scale, because of the huge amounts of carbon dioxide emitted in making the stuff. In cases like this where its compressive strength is not required and all you basically need is bulk, it is a terrible choice of material.
 

The exile

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Almost makes you wonder whether the "Great Musgrave solution" was arranged by someone who had lost the argument regarding maintenance of these bridges and thought "how can I stir up a mass of public opinion against the infilling while still 'following orders'?"
 

416GSi

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It appears that the whole scheme has now be halted:-

The Guardian, 30th July 2021

Britain’s Victorian railway bridges may be saved in new green travel plan​

Grant Shapps presents walking and cycling scheme, after Highways England slammed for pouring concrete into railway arch
Victorian railway bridges that were due to be filled in with concrete in an act previously decried as “cultural vandalism” will be repurposed as part of a scheme to encourage walking and cycling, the UK transport secretary has announced.

The government is halting the demolition of historic train lines in the hope that they can be remodelled as routes which encourage greener means of travel......

 

XAM2175

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I wonder how many sites are included in the "risk to public safety" exemption?
However, Friday’s announcement means all infilling and demolition plans – except for those at sites posing a risk to public safety – will be paused as the areas are considered for development as cycle routes.
 

option

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Are the roads that go over these bridges a Highways England responsibility, or are they County Council?
 

WesternLancer

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Are the roads that go over these bridges a Highways England responsibility, or are they County Council?
I would tend to think that where they are not trunk roads (and I expect most of them are not) they will be the responsibility of the local highways authority (usually a county council but in a unitary council area that would not be the case).

However, if it is decided that they should have planning permission for such work (as Eden District Council has now claimed), that is a District Council responsibility (apart from in a Unitary area) not a county responsibility.

Planners in districts and highways staff in counties would not always be expected to agree on matters...
 

yorksrob

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I've seen in Rail Magazine the effort at Great Musgrave.

Highways England are clearly not firt for purpose. Reform is needed
 

WesternLancer

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It appears that the whole scheme has now be halted:-



Use of 'may' in the title is always to be noted. All sorts of things 'may' happen.

and this is a big caveat of course

“establish a formalised framework and engagement process for these structures, to understand in each case whether there is a realistic prospect of it being used for active travel or other transport purposes in future”.

But that is at least something, there should be a proper process that people can engage with - even if that was just the planning permission process. This should be more relevant than that. The definition is going to be around 'realistic prospect' of course.

But no doubt this campaign has been successful on getting at least a partial U turn and embarrassing those who have tried to pursue this.
 

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