Achilles project aims for added infrastructure resilience

In the UK alone, there are 748,000 properties with at least a 1-in-100 annual chance of flooding, while train derailment caused by slope failure is the greatest infrastructure-related risk faced by the railways.

The cost of infrastructure failures is also high, with emergency repairs costing Network Rail ten times as much as planned works, which in turn cost ten times as much as maintenance.

The £4.8m EPSRC-funded project, led by researchers at Newcastle University, is aiming to get a better understanding of the way linear infrastructure deteriorates under increasing environmental pressures, such as more extreme weather, according to project leader Dr Stephanie Glendinning, of Newcastle’s School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences.

The research programme, Assessment, Costing and enHancement of long life Long Linear Assets (ACHILLES), involves researchers from Southampton, Durham, Loughborough, Leeds and Bath Universities, plus the British Geological Survey, infrastructure owners and consultants.

“We don’t actually know which slopes are going to fail and when, so we’re trying to identify at-risk places on the network, so that they can be pre-emptively monitored and perhaps repaired,” said Glendinning.