Victoria Park / Cracks survey, Has this been forgotten??? Options

[Richard Garvie]

So we've waited months and months to discover the results of the NTC survey into what caused cracks throughout the town centre and the sinking of land in Victoria Park. Everything has gone quiet and we, the taxpayer, still do not know what caused the problems.

Was it the development of Parkway that caused the issue? Has anything been paid to remedy the issue? Certain people on here were complaining that there was always a little reminder story in the paper, but surely that was a good thin? Now most people have forgotten, maybe that was the plan all along? Slowly let it drift off into the long grass so we never have to learn what really happened?

It's time to publish the results!!

[Trumpet]

My understanding of the root cause was that the water table is/was very high in Parkway and that in order to contruct the new Mall the builders began pumping water out, thus reducing the water table, resulting in cracks and and subsidance appearing in the surrounding areas i.e. Victoria Park.

Of course if they were to stop pumping then this may result in the water table rising and thus turning the underground parking into a an underground swiming pool ? I don't know what the answer is, but I do hope that the Council are not asked to spend our taxes to pay for the remedy like they were for the faulty library roof.

[Andy Capp]

SLI claimed to have built the carpark in a concrete 'basin' which was dewatered. In theory, it shouldn't have effected the land outside the boundry of this 'basin'.

[Richard Garvie]

Will we ever know the truth?

[Berkshirelad]

SLI claimed to have built the carpark in a concrete 'basin' which was dewatered. In theory, it shouldn't have effected the land outside the boundry of this 'basin'.

Not now that it is built perhaps.

But what about the extensive pumping whilst it was built.

If that is the cause, then the water table should recover for itself over time - which may explain the delay in finalising any report. IOW, if he situation recovers then it is likely that the cause was the pumping by Costain; if it doesn't then it was some other cause

[Andy Capp]

Not now that it is built perhaps.

But what about the extensive pumping whilst it was built.

If that is the cause, then the water table should recover for itself over time - which may explain the delay in finalising any report. IOW, if he situation recovers then it is likely that the cause was the pumping by Costain; if it doesn't then it was some other cause

I understand the pumping was for the contents of the basin (more of a subterranean skirt than a bowl), not anywhere else. If so, in theory, it shouldn't have affected anywhere else.

[Simon Kirby]

I understand the pumping was for the contents of the basin (more of a subterranean skirt than a bowl), not anywhere else. If so, in theory, it shouldn't have affected anywhere else.

That's right, they construct a coffer dam which they excavate and dewater so they can build the underground structure before letting the ground-water back in and removing the dam. You just pump out the contents of the dam and then any ground water that continues to leak in. The aquifer extends for miles and contains millions and millions of gallons, which in gravles that the park sits on is very mobile so it's quite impossible to draw down the water table in the park just by dewatering a coffer dam.

The survey would have shown that immediately, and the council panicked because they'd already been flapping their mouths about how SLI were responsible for such and such, and so they did the only thing they know - they did nothing.

I would very much like to know exactly what damage is actually supposed to have been done, and what of that damage has anything whatsoever to do with the NTC. I'm particularly interested to know whether members of the Friends Group own properties that are alleged to have been affected, because sad as it is, the NTC have no business spending my tax investigating that - though NTC do need a Friends Group to convince the HLF that they do community, which of course they don't. The park wall and the paths are being replaced anyway in the re-furb so why waste time and money arguing the apparently unsupportable proposition that SLI were responsible for damaging them - it was a hot dry year, and they were badly built, end of. And in any case, the NTC lease the park from WBC, and it's very unusual for a lease to contain a repairing obligation, so these structures are the responsibility of WBC, or at the very least the insurers, as is the toilet block that NTC don't even lease. As for the football pitch, all it needed was a couple of dumpy bags of top soil and the surface was fine.

I very much suspect that the Council are not now able to walk away and rather than the question being about proving SLI's liability, they are being hard-pressed to defend their ill-informed and ill-judged blatherings, and as losing the argument will cost the public a considerable sum there's just no reason not to gamble everything in the bank - not in the public interest, but to save the individuals concerned from the inevitable consequences of their incompetance being exposed.