Friday 23 September 2016

Material World

Warwickslade Cutting, infilling of minor drain - geograph.org.uk - 1464070One concern I think we all share about the Latchmore Brook project is the transport of the infill materials.  This is due to cause a certain amount disturbance and inconvenience to those residents and visitors along the delivery routes, as well as valid questions about the safety for both road and Forest users, man and beast.   I've already had a private go at the FC and LUC over their need to provide concise and useful figures for the public to properly convey the size of the issue.  Here I attempt a stop-gap.

Movement of materials to the nine stockpiles to service nine different project areas is due to run over four different access routes in two or three of the four years of the overall project.  Two of these access routes are via relatively well used roads, the B3078 Roger Penny Way from either Godshill or Brook to Telegraph Hill, and the turning from the A31 to Stony Cross, then the turning towards Slufters and Cadman's Pool, followed by the turn towards HighCorner /Linwood, almost immediately turning off onto the Forest Track to Holly Hatch / Alderhill.  The more problematic routes go through the village / cul de sac Fritham, home of the Royal Oak pub, which some consider the unofficial office of the NFA, the other through the village of South Gorley and Ogdens. 

As you drive northeast up the unnamed road towards Ogdens, many of the houses grow larger. You'll pass Fir Tree Farm, one of the best placed and few remaining commercial stables on the Forest, its manège is only a fence and a few feet away from the narrow lane, riders in the school may not appreciate the extra challenge to their control and aid skills as their mounts react to passing tipper lorries.  After the stables, the road becomes a forest track, with more modest dwellings fronting directly and quite closely to the road.

Naturally we have every sympathy for those who may be effected.  All the more reason to get at some realistic, and relate-able numbers.

I've seen and heard alarming figures, 70HGV movements a day or 44000 HGVs over the course of the project, which I've discovered to be ridiculously overblown.  Not that I blame anyone for getting this wrong as the planning documents do not lay out the information in a helpful way. I had to bounce around four or five of the submitted statements and appendices to pull this together.


1.3 The works are anticipated to last for approximately 4-12 weeks (July-September) per year over a period of 4 years. If weather conditions are poor (wet), works may halted temporarily to protect ground conditions.

4.9 The highest maximum number of deliveries for each route to the site per day has been calculated as follows:
  • Ogdens - 25 HGVs and 4 tractor/trailer deliveries per day.
  • Alderhill - 25 HGVs and 4 tractor/trailer deliveries per day.
  • Fritham - 25 HGVs and 4 tractor/trailer deliveries per day.
  • Telegraph Hill - 25 HGVs and 4 tractor/trailer deliveries per day.
4.10 In addition to the HGV movements set out above, there will be approximately six employees on site associated with the restoration works (i.e. total 12 movements per day).


In two of the planning documents we are only given maximums or ranges, we're told a maximum of 25 HGV deliveries per day per route, a window of 4-12 weeks in each of the four years, this last is the beginning of distortion as only the 2019 Phase is 12 weeks July to September the other three are 4-8 weeks August-September.

Back to one of the numbers being bandied about by alarmists.  70 HGV's per day.  If someone has quoted this figure at you, they are either lying, or unknowingly passing on an intentional lie.  The only way one could arrive at the number 70 is to take the maximum 25 HGV deliveries, the 4 tractor/trailer, plus up to 6 staff vehicles for a total of 35 roundtrips = 70 movements, only 50 movements are HGV (still not a small amount, but smaller, and a maximum, averages may be lower).  As we'll note later, despite the stated maximum of 4 tractor/trailer deliveries per day conjuring an equal level of traffic, the number bale deliveries becomes negligible very quickly.

Here's the initial information I pulled out of the "Appendix 4.1: Estimated Restoration Material Quantities and Transport Movements Data" (a diabolically poorly laid out document in which every 2 out of three tables has a single line, in some case, a single cell).  The 22 separate tables are easily and more usefully aggregated into three tables, the first gives us Material Quantities, the primary information we need to derive the number of deliveries, the other two Maximum number of deliveries per day clay/gravel/hoggin and heather bales respectively (plus Delivery timescale for HGV loads).   You'll forgive the small size required to squeeze this in here.  The more important summary tables that follow will be suitably legible.

Table 1: Estimated Material Quantities
Project Area Stockpile Lorry Route Hoggin & Washed Gravels (tonnes) Clay (tonnes) Minimum Tipper Deliveries Minimum Tipper Days _ Heather Bales Minimum Tractor Deliveries Minimum Tractor Days
Islands Thorns Picket Corner Telegraph Hill 10004.6 4001.8 702 29
1815 7 2
Islands Thorns Islands Thorns Fritham 5002.3 2000.9 352 15
1815 7 2
Islands Thorns Fritham Bridge Fritham 5002.3 2000.9 352 15



Thompson’s Castle: Hampton Ridge Telegraph Hill




460 2 1
Thompson’s Castle: Ogdens Car Park Ogdens 2071.0 829 146 6



Latchmore Mire: Hampton Ridge Telegraph Hill




1944 7 2
Studley Wood: Claypits Telegraph Hill 5860 2344 411 17
986 4 1
Studley Wood: Picket Corner Telegraph Hill 5860 2344 411 17



Ogdens Mire: Ogdens Mire Ogdens




2280 8 2
Ogdens Mire: Ogdens Car Park Ogdens 99.75 39.9 7 1



Amberwood and Alderhill Inclosures: Fritham Bridge Fritham 9662.43 3864.97 678 28



Amberwood and Alderhill Inclosures: Alderhill Inclosure Alderhill 9662.43 3864.97 678 28
1920 7 2
Sloden: Sloden Inclosure Alderhill 5671.5 2268.6 398 16



Watergreen Bottom: Alderhill Inclosure Alderhill




500 2 1
Latchmore Shade: Ogdens Car Park Ogdens 9755.4 3902.16 684 28














TOTALS

68651.71 27461.2 4819 200
11720 44 13

I have added four columns of calculations, number of both deliveries and days for each material.  In each case all numbers are rounded up to the nearest whole number before being used as a factor in the next calculation.  These are based on both the optimal 100% load capacity and the maximum number of deliveries per day, and so derive the minimum number of deliveries necessary for each location/phase/route of the project.  Depending on your point of view, this is perhaps the best case scenario, the maximum amount of disruption each day, but the fewest number of days.

Table 1a1: Estimated Material Quantities by Route by Year HGVs

Year Lorry Route Hoggin & Washed Gravels (tonnes) Clay (tonnes) Minimum Tipper Deliveries Minimum Tipper Days
2019 Alderhill 15333.93 6133.57 1076 44
2020 Alderhill



2017 Fritham 10004.60 4001.80 704 30
2019 Fritham 9662.43 3864.97 678 28
2017 Ogdens 2071.00 829.00 146 6
2018 Ogdens 99.75 39.90 7 1
2020 Ogdens 9755.40 3902.16 684 28
2017 Telegraph Hill 10004.60 4001.80 702 29
2018 Telegraph Hill 11720.00 4688.00 822 34







TOTALS 68651.71 27461.20 4819 200


If the lorry loads are always at fullest capacity, than the number of deliveries remains constant.  That's the minimum number of deliveries that would have to happen, you could have them in the fewest number of days if the maximum deliveries per day is reached, but more likely you may want to spread that pain.

 Table 1b1: Estimated Deliveries/Days by Route by Year and Comparison to %90 Capacity / 20 deliveries/day snapshot

Year Lorry Route Minimum Tipper Deliveries 90% Capacity Tipper Deliveries Minimum Tipper Days 90% Capacity 20 Max Tipper Days
2019 Alderhill 1076 1195 44 61
2020 Alderhill



2017 Fritham 704 780 30 40
2019 Fritham 678 752 28 38
2017 Ogdens 146 163 6 9
2018 Ogdens 7 9 1 1
2020 Ogdens 684 759 28 38
2017 Telegraph Hill 702 779 29 39
2018 Telegraph Hill 822 914 34 46







Totals 4819 5351 200 272

For a lesser case scenario, I tweaked numbers for HGV loads at 90% of Capacity, which would increase the number of deliveries required, and thus the number of days, and further increased the number of days by decreasing the maximum deliveries per day to 20.  This makes for some useful comparisons.

Table 1a2: Estimated Material Quantities by Route by Year Tractor/Trailer


Year Lorry Route Heather Bales Minimum Tractor Deliveries Minimum Tractor Days
2019 Alderhill 1920 7 2
2020 Alderhill 500 2 1
2017 Fritham 1815 7 2
2019 Fritham


2017 Ogdens


2018 Ogdens 2280 8 2
2020 Ogdens


2017 Telegraph Hill 4219 16 5
2018 Telegraph Hill 986 4 1






TOTALS 11720 44 13

Heather Bales will by delivered by tractor/trailers with a capacity of 300 Bales per  delivery.  We've also been told there's a maximum of 4 deliveries per route per day.  It's tempting to simply add that to the other numbers of daily deliveries, but the problem with that is that there are not that many deliveries of bales needed compared to the other infill materials.  At maximum capacity, there would need to be 44 deliveries for the entire project, not per year, not per route, the whole bale of wax.  If you were to spread those evenly by year by route that's less than 3.  I can't conceive that 3 extra tractor trailers per YEAR would be noticeable on even the quietest routes.  For our lesser case scenario, we run at ¾ full, and that ups the total deliveries to 58.

 Table 1b2: Estimated Deliveries/Days by Route by Year and Comparison to %75 Capacity snapshot

Year Lorry Route Minimum Tractor Deliveries 75% Capacity Tractor Deliveries Minimum Tractor Days 75% Capacity Tractor Days
2019 Alderhill 7 9 2 3
2020 Alderhill 2 3 1 1
2017 Fritham 7 9 2 3
2019 Fritham



2017 Ogdens



2018 Ogdens 8 11 2 3
2020 Ogdens



2017 Telegraph Hill 16 21 5 7
2018 Telegraph Hill 4 5 1 2







Totals 44 58 13 19

Of course it's not that evenly spread, as we see when we look at the data, but the Fritham and Ogdens routes would need 7 and 8 deliveries respectively for the whole project.  It gets better than that, the number of bale deliveries coming by road routes might be nil:


For the purposes of the assessment it has been assumed that the heather bales will be transported from outside the catchment via the four routes listed below, thereby assessing a worst case scenario in terms of potential effects. However, it is more than likely that the heather bales will be harvested from within the open forest areas near to the Latchmore Catchment and public roads will not be needed to transport them to the areas of the proposed works.

Table 1c: Total Estimated Deliveries/Days over course of whole project by Route and Comparison to Worst Case snapshot (in combining Days for both Infill and Bale Delivery, overlap has been accounted for.)

Lorry Route Minimum Deliveries Worst Case Deliveries
Minimum Days Worst Case Days
Alderhill 1085 1207
45 62
Fritham 1389 1541
58 78
Ogdens 845 942
35 48
Telegraph Hill 1544 1719
63 85
Totals 4863 5409
201 273

It is also important to note that some mitigation measures are already in the plan which include: The same drivers will be used, and will be made aware of the "possible pedestrians, cyclists and livestock in the carriageway", there will be "speed restrictions for delivery vehicles;" - 15mph on the Forest gravel tracks, 5mph under the ordinary 20mph restriction under the byelaws, and "traffic management with radios on the Ogdens route" as well as term time restrictions for school run to local schools.  For those concerned about the condition of their roads, there will be a survey of the local highway network before and after the restoration phase to identify and agree any remedial works reasonably attributable to the restoration activities.  (Full list in ES Vol 3 Appendix 4.2 Construction Traffic Management Plan Section 5).

We hope that this analysis goes a little way to giving a realistic scale to the potential problems.  Even if some may still want to scare monger, at least they should have more realistic numbers.  But we don't want fear, we want sensible and proportional discussion.  And no, we don't expect that this solves any remaining concerns - whether or not conditions are placed on the planning application to suggest further mitigation, there may still be work needed by both the Forestry Commission and local residents to accommodate each other fairly.