The street starts to take shape

The groundworks contractors are now working to form the street from both ends at once.  Down at the far end of terrace D the rock face has been exposed at the bottom and and cleaned, and looks like it will form an even nicer back drop than expected

The retaining wall at the top of the rockface will remain more or less as it is now.  The rockface is due to be inspected by and expert geologist to check nothing is likely to fall of it.  Any smaller loose chunks will be removed, whilst if there are any bigger loose bits they may need to be bolted in place. 

The late afternoon sun catches the rock face....  This is where the upstairs living 3 bed houses will be.

There may be a natural "bin store" area cut into the rock on the street part way along Terrace D.  Sorry, it's not a great photo of that!  We will have a better idea once a bit more digging has been done here. 

Towards the west end of Terrace D some rock (in the centre of the photo) will need to be pecked out.  We don't know exactly how wide the street will be yet.  The line of the rock race we have uncovered is to be surveyed next week.  Along the part of Terrace D which does not already have a stone wall above the rockface, the 1 in 1 vegetated slope will start from the top of the newly exposed rock face (which runs towards the bottom left hand corner of the picture).  We don't know exactly how high this will be yet, but is looking like around a meter of vertical natural rock before the slope we will be building starts.

Meanwhile close to Halton Mill at the west end of the street the old cobbles have been removed and stockpiled for use in gabions, and the street adjacent to Terrace A is now close to its final level.  The green door in the middle of this photo is where the communal bike store will be.

And here's a close up - the series of holes have been prepared ready for the underpinning of the storage part of what we know as "building 2" next week.  This is necessary because the new level of the street is slightly lower than previous ground levels - to ensure all our houses are easily wheelchair accessible.

This was the moment when the engineers looked down a  trial foundation  trench for terrace A.  It doesn't always take 4 men to dig one hole using a JCB.  The verdict, the ground will be suitable after a little extra compacting, so the foundations of the Common House and Terrace A should be poured this week.

Finally, at the west end of Terrace F, the huge brick base of the former boiler house chimney has now been removed, revealing a stone retaining wall behind.  We are hoping that there will be space in this recess to accommodate some very deep manholes which will take foul and surface water down from the upper level, under Terrace F, to the street.  If this proves feasible it should save us some money.

Hopefully the next post will show more of the area around Terraces C-E.  The big problem is safely accommodating all the material which is having to be temporarily removed!

Jon

www.lancastercohousing.org.uk