Sheet Piling (UK) Ltd Completes Clacton Cliff Reinforcement Project

 The impacts of coastal erosion in Clacton-on-Sea and Holland-on-Sea have been stemmed using 21st century sheet pile techniques and the technical expertise of the team at the UK’s leading sheet piling specialist, Sheet Piling (UK) Ltd.

Slippage of the crumbling cliffs in the Essex resort had been threatening a 200m stretch of the town’s tourism assets and infrastructure since February 2020, leading to the removal of 13 iconic beach huts and fears for the upper and lower promenade, sewer systems and seafront road.

Recognising the seriousness of the issue, Tendring District Council reallocated £2.1m to address it, appointing contractor, Breheny Civil Engineering, who brought in Sheet Piling UK, to handle the sheet pile works.  Breheny has a long-standing relationship with the sheet pile specialist, trusting its expertise and solutions-driven approach.

The brief was to not only strengthen the cliffs which required such urgent attention but to also ensure no further slippage of the existing slope during the installation of the cliff-retaining steel sheet piles.

This was made more challenging by the restricted access to the cliff face, via the narrow promenade, 15 metres from the line at which the steel sheet piles needed to be installed.  No vibratory equipment could be used, so Sheet Piling UK designed the project around silent and vibrationless sheet pile installation, supplying a Giken F201 pile pressing machine, serviced by a Sennebogen 673R telescopic crawler crane, from its own fleet of equipment.

Ordinarily, the stiff-to-very-stiff clay - the ground conditions at the pile line - would have been softened by using a water jetting technique.  However, in this case, this was not appropriate.  Together with Breheny, Sheet Piling UK’s in-house design team developed a working procedure that minimised the amount of water used to assist pile pressing, particularly in the zone above the critical slip planes that had developed within the slope failure.

Working with this equipment and the specially devised methodology, which adapted typical pressing techniques to the unique scenario of this coastal erosion project, Sheet Piling UK installed 315, thirteen-metre-long steel sheet piles at one of the locations in Clacton-on-Sea (Kings Parade) and a further 95 sheet piles, of the same length, at Russell Road.

Sheet Piling UK’s managing director, Andrew Cotton, says: “We completed the works for this coastal erosion project over a seven-week period in summer 2021, ensuring that Clacton-on-Sea, which has been delighting visitors since its foundation in 1871, can continue to do so.  The strengthening of the cliff has paved the way for 30 more beach huts to be installed, bolstering the economic benefits that traditional English seaside resorts can derive from beach huts.  

“As importantly, the works have safeguarded the Victorian infrastructure of the promenades in the resort, ensuring that these can continue to delight visitors. Coastal erosion has been tackled by steel sheet piling and a solution that should be viable for 50-100 years.”

To discover the many other uses of steel sheet piles in modern-day infrastructure design or renewal, please visit www.sheetpilinguk.com                                          

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Editors notes

Sheet Piling (UK) Ltd is the UK's leading national sheet piling contractor and sheet pile installation specialist, with over 25 years' experience of handling a wide variety of land and marine-based projects. It supplies both permanent and temporary sheet pile solutions and has a fleet of cutting-edge equipment, including its unique and specially commissioned long-reach telescopic leader rigs, which have a reach 3m further than any other rig.