Work continues apace part one

Despite the continuing bad weather, work on the project has stepped up a gear.  Piling work continued until quite late into the evening, maybe to catch up on lost time when the weather was too bad to operate.   Stripping of the route of the embankment has also continued.  Network Rail has applied to quarry chalk locally which will apparently save 22,000 lorry movements.  Naturally this has delighted the residents of the Wilbury Hills area who are understandably concerned about the high number of large lorries passing through on their way to the site.  However this has angered environmentalists and countryside groups who do not want the local landscape ruined by quarrying.  There are also a number of ancient burial barrows in the area.  Network Rail want to quarry chalk from Wilbury Hill to the north of the future embankment adjacent to the main work site.  They say that they will reinstate the hillside after the work is completed.  The timescale for the work to be completed is end of August for the embankment and 7th September for the land re-instatement.  This seems like an ambitious timescale but we will soon see if this is the case or not.  For those interested the details of the work can be found here:-

http://www.north-herts.gov.uk/docfilesrv/1/00/97/52/00975242.pdf

I was able to make a brief visit to the west side of the main line today and took a few pictures.  I noticed yesterday test boring of  Wilbury Hill has started so weather permitting I will take a closer look over that side.

 First picture shows the pile driver now working on the lower level.  It appears as if the piles have been completed on the upper level.

 Moving up onto the higher level I took this shot looking back south.

 Another shot further up.  It is hard to make out but centre left you can just make out a group of recently poured piles.

 Moving north along the former Bedford line embankment, you can see the formwork being built up on what will be a viaduct support column.

  Looking over the main line to the other side , you can see in front of the crane another one being. constructed.   After a slow start, construction of the viaduct seems to picking up speed now.

There was a fair bit of activity on the site today and there was a group of workmen over by the hoarding.  Not sure exactly what they were doing but there was a digger loading dumper trucks on the lower level which were bring material up on to the higher ground.  There is another heap of concrete tops from the poured piles.  To the right, the extensive network of water pipes has been dismantled and stacked up.  This is also evidence that the pile driving is finished here.