NRA Infrastructure Achievement of the Year 2024: Keltbray and Network Rail

The Infrastructure Achievement of the Year award in the national Rail Awards went to Keltbray and Network Rail for the LTS Mk1 OLE Replacement.

A Highly Commended went to Morgan Sindall Infrastructure for the Parsons Tunnel Rockfall Shelter.

Keltbray has been credited by the NRA judges with bringing overhead line fitment and renewal “into the 21st century” through its development of new techniques for this £20 million project to eliminate 150 wire defects on the London Fenchurch Street to Tilbury and Southend route operated by c2c.

Significant gains were delivered by Keltbray’s use of the ZECK road-rail wiring unit, developed with NR in 2016 to slash wiring installation time by 50% and costs by 42% through its ability to deliver simultaneous contact and catenary wiring at full tension.

The ZECK is also less dependent on engineering possessions by being able to access and travel under live overhead line equipment. The increased automation and use of specialist mobile plant machinery offered health and safety benefits by reducing staff exposure to manual handling.

To further minimise the impact of the works that took place between April 2022 and February this year, Keltbray devised a Level Crossing Management Plan to avoid the full closure of 44 affected level crossings.

This new approach reduced dependency on local authority timelines and approvals, minimising community disruption and ensuring 100% of planned wire runs over public crossings were achieved to a tight engineering schedule.

Keltbray estimated savings of around two million road vehicle route diversion journeys, one million pedestrian journey diversions and £247,000 in traffic management costs from fewer road closures.

Together with more efficient ways of working and a cut in possessions from 90 to 60, total cost savings against the original project benchmark have been estimated to be more than £7m.

The judges concluded: “This is an incredibly impressive approach to a bread-and-butter renewal that challenges norms and standards, reduces cost and disruption and eliminates whole elements of hazardous manual handling at height.”

Go to our results story for a list of all the winners at the 2024 National Rail Awards, together with more pictures from the event at the JW Marriott Grosvenor House hotel, Park Lane, London on 12th September.