@@tonys1636 thank you that's interesting! I was thinking from the point who approved planning permission for/surveyed location of the pipes although I understand choice would be limited
Best fact I know as being not far away from here is the locals actually held a birthday party once the road passed the first anniversary of the collapse
that road is amazing or terrifying depending on if you drive off it. You cant blame Thames Water, you see they need to spend billions on shareholder dividends which are far more important than maintenance
Well you might have a point, but don't expect nationalisation to improve how these utilities are run, just after privatisation I worked on the digitising the old paper maps of the Yorkshire Water network, the maps were ancient and it was obvious that they hadn't been kept up to date or nobody had a clue where most of the pipes were, what they were made of or how long they been there.
There has been no investment in sewage treatment or reservoirs since privatisation so we don’t keep pace with the numbers of people who now live in the UK which is one reason they are full of shit. Keep costs high and maintenance low for dividends
@@tomcat2395 Exactly. Private for-profit companies have no motivation to do anything but what they're forced to over whatever drives profit. How old are these anti-nat loons? They must not be old enough to remember a time before privatization and have their head full of their sociology teacher's nonsense.
@@medler2110almost certainly that information was word-of-mouth & need-to-know but would have been thorough (though only mapped privately by the workers). It's an ancient way of preserving jobs, sacking the people with the knowledge has proved much more costly than retaining them.
@@tomcat2395indeed, paying shareholder dividends is written into several very strict laws but maintenance isn't a legal requirement at all 😢 (Although dropping cliffs on businesses carries legal penalties).
Chalk and water. Water freezes, creates cracks. More water gets in, slightly acidic makes cracks bigger. Eventually the whole thing becomes unstable and cliffs collapse (ask anyone who has lived near Brighton to Eastbourne). So safest answer - take the whole thing down and build a bridge....or leave it and one day it will fall down on its own.
Yes I think they have decided to do that. (It doesn’t cost them too much just not having that road there at all any more…) just more traffic through the back streets I expect..
Problem with this will be the lawyers - Council will want water co. to foot the bill for bridge, water co. will want to remediate only. and the lawyers will go round and round like hamsters until the end of time.
I live in swanscombe, me and my partner drove up that road the morning of the road collapse, there was water gushing down the road from a burst water pipe, there are plenty other witnesses to this but thames water cannot seem to comprehend how on earth it could be their fault!
I grew up in Swanscombe, took the bus to school in Gravesnd along this road for years, walked by dog in the old chalk pits either side of the road for years and awlays marvelled a the stupidity of the chalk excavations going so close to the road. The fact that nothing was ever done to support this road before this happened is insane, even though for decades it was the main route between Dartford and Gravesend before Bluewater opened and the Eurotunnel station was built and a load of new roads were built to give alternative routes.
I live in Swanscombe and this has caused nightmares with traffic, for a good 6 months before this happened we were all reporting water leaks on this section of road and Thames water did fuck all.
@@mikecrimlis3366 but our current tory government and the huge for profit companies their lot keep selling our assets too also share the 'it's going to be a future problem for poor people to deal with' stance.
Wow haha, I was shocked to see you cover this story, This road has caused so much havoc in Swanscombe and Northfleet especially when there is congestion or an accident on the A2 which is pretty much every day. I used to use this road whenever there was a problem on the A2. And I dont see it being fixed anytime soon. 🙄
Used to take about 30 mins to get to Bluewater from Gravesend on a bus, on a decent day with not too much traffic. The diversion caused by this road collapse is so convoluted, it’s now genuinely quicker to get a train from Gravesend to Greenhithe, and a bus from there onwards to Bluewater. Not cheap but it’s probably an hour of your life not spent on a diversion that makes you wish to god you had a car.
The drone shots for this one are great! Whoever decided this monstrosity of landscaping was a good idea is surely suffering an endless pothole filled journey in hell.
If you send a drone up and circle the area it looks like a piece of honeycomb where the chalk has been removed over the years in a multitude of similar places.
Being on a parish council it's not unusual for there to be wrangling when it comes down to the responsibility and upkeep of certain features. Water companies, local councils, Highways Agency and landowners usually point at each other in a Spiderman type of way.
There's a similar situation on the A635 in South Yorkshire. Some genius torched a car under a bridge. Road closed. Then opened as a traffic light controlled single lane. Then closed again. Traffic diverted through the two nearby residential and industrial areas. Heavy traffic and lots of it!
As a railwayman, I'd be more concerned about the railway running south of there between Swanscombe and Northfleet on a similar chalk embankment. The railway you show was constructed around 1999 and is HS1, or the Channel Tunnel line. They had to cut the chalk out of the A226 road and provide the bridge. Same happened to the rail route between Swanscome and Northfleet. EEK!
If the material is so valuable, the surrounding area was entirely quarried away. Why not finish the job quarry away the section with the road on it, leaving a ramp at each end to join on to the bridge and the continuation of the road. Surely this would be cheaper than building a bridge and would leave the road at a convenient level for the surrounding access.
The elevation change is much greater than it appears in the video, so this would be totally impractical, the gradient up to the top of the hill would be far too steep. The chalk is only valuable if you have a local use for it, such as cement factories, but they are all long gone.
@@rickconstant6106 yeh i agree but the boffins will want to do a tunnel and go under the railway then a ramp to no wheres and a bridge over the ramp and let it sit for 50 years and say ,WELL WE HAD AN IDEA A PLAN but it was crazy, so we abandoned it,, nice bridge though it won awards in its day
A similar collapse on the busy A6025 in West Yorkshire meant that the road was closed between Feb 2020 and Feb 2022. Instead of getting on with the work to repair the road, the council seemed more concerned with finding someone else to pay for it. The delays must have cost the local economy several times the actual cost of the repairs. It was 17 months before repairs started. I suspect there are many similarities with the apparent inaction at this site.
A very well put together piece. Brought back some memories as I used to work in an industrial unit on Lower Road, the other side of the railway. Used to drive down Galley Hill nearly every day before I retired in 2016. I always thought that to have a main road that was so constricted by excavations either side could mean issues for up keep. It would seem that is now the case. Glad I don't have to use a alternative route to get to work. They were happy days, although some of them weren't!
This road is round the corner from my work and I've lived in the area all my life, my dad remembers when they were meant to use the backfill from the channel tunnel to strengthen the cliff but put it into an area near cheriton to make an industrial estate. Alot of businesses are struggling because of this road being ruined. As far as im aware they're still arguing who's paying between Dartford Borough Council, Thames Water and Kent Highways. Oh and they're planning on redeveloping the area by the football ground in the future too so that road needs to be fixed asap
Thames water are playing the long game. Going to go bankrupt before anything happens and whoever takes over will have to pay (the government, therefore the taxpayer).
There is a road in Leigh on Sea that has had temporary traffic lights for over a year, maybe two, due to it being on the side of a cliff, and badgers have burrowed under the road causing risk of a slip and subsidence!
This is just one part of many similar roads in the area, some of the quarrying has been backfilled with various rubbish and building and other waste, the pits Bluewater shopping Centre was built in was supposed to be reinstated after Blue Circle finished quarrying, but the local government body responsible for the mineral rights extraction aggreement couldn't find that part of the documentation when quarrying was completed also as the water table was breached fresh water from the aquifer is now being pumped 24 hrs a day into the Thames to prevent the shopping centre from flooding. Maybe next time theyre contemplating a hosepie ban, someone should turn the pumps off!
This was a main daily route for me in the lorry until it collapsed, really inconvenient if you ask me. Locals have said the local authorities probably won’t fix it due to the cost.
There is a bridge in North wales called Llanerch Bridge in Trefnant . It was washed away in January 2021, and it still hasn’t been replaced and no time line to replace it.
Hammersmith bridge in west London closed in 2019, due to cracks. It's listed, so they can't knock it down, & they can't afford to repair it. The IRA tried to blow it up twice, if we ask nicely could someone more competent try again, then they might build a bridge fit for modern life. Not sure why it's grade two listed, it's fugly.
Everyone is trying to get out of paying for the repairs, the water leaks could have been caused by movement of the roadway and the movement of the roadway could be caused by water leaks. However rain water has a PH of 4.2 to 4.4 so will dissolve the chalk a lot quicker than a leak of hard water......
The top is nicely sealed by the road so rain only hits the sides which will weather down over time but can easily be inspected. Water under pressure will cause serious erosion no matter it's PH. You can literally cut metal, granite... pretty much anything with water if you get enough pressure so it's easy to see how it will erode chalk, especially when left to go on for so long.
@@thebrowns5337 the number of times I've heard that one.... Roads arn't impervious to water ingress. Why do you think national highways spends millions a year on waterproofing bridge decks?
@@timballam3675 the velocity and volumes between water seeping gently through layers of bitumen and stone vs jetting out of a pressurised pipe are vastly different though. Using your example for bridge decks they waterproof them because we use a salt/grit/urea mixture to spray our roads with in winter and the small amount of this that can pass through carriageway surfacing will, over time, corrode the steel reinforcement used in the concrete deck. The waterproofing isn't there because there is a massive flow. We dont waterproof arch bridges and the oartar is not washed out from above and I can show you many bridges where, if we exposed the deck and the fill behind the abutment you would see no specific drainage, just PFA or 6n - again demonstrating water flow and volume are not much of a consideration at all. I worked for many years in a 'structure' team and bridges were our main thing.
Removing the chalk and putting a bridge over the same span is probably the only realistic long-term solution; fortunately, the entire other side of the wall appears to be empty space, so the removal could be set up so that most or all of the debris would fall that way, and not further impact the occupied lots.
"Built on a vertical pile of chalk, what could possibly go wrong". They could try and spin this, or just admit that it was always going to fail at some point and knock the whole lot down. They could use it as infill for a new road levelling out the land.
Reminds me of the Petersham Hole on the main road between Richmond and Kingston which was closed for over a year in 79/80. We had to get off the 65 bus, walk down some side streets and get on another bus on the other side of the hole. Road traffic was diverted via Richmond Park.
Very similar to the B5605 newbridge road , the old main road been closed for 4 years and no sign of repair , all traffic is going on the a5 but when there is a crash or high winds its a 10 mile diversion via llangollen
The A377 from Barnstaple to Exeter has had multiple subsidence issues, one took 3 years to finally complete another one is still there after at least 2 years controlled by traffic lights.... naturally it is full of massive potholes as well.
There's a similar situation down here on the south of the Isle of Wight, only replace "burst water pipe" with falling into the sea due to a lot of bad weather we had over several months. You should come down here and do a video on that. Also, the Military road here is meters away from the cliff edge at certain points as well.
Similar problem here in New Zealand with the road through the Manawatu Gorge, with several landslides and slips interfering with traffic flow. The solution chosen here is to build what amounts to a bypass.
@@solariss452The Scottish ferries are great for Road Trip Island hopping down the West Coast 👍 Lucky for the Scottish population, the "Barnett Formula" means English's Tax payers subside the ferries, so a 30min ferry ride for car & two people is ~£16..!! Though the H&S on the ferries is a bit suspect at times.... So get what you pay for ..!! 😬
There's a section of that same road (the A3055 coming out of Ventnor) that has been "temporarily closed" for ten years now and looks like it will be abandoned to nature and never reopen. Another section of the same A road leading into Ventnor collapsed recently and looks like it will share the same fate leaving a couple of narrow and dangerous B roads (one of which is also collapsing) the only thing stopping Ventnor being completely cut off. Worth a whole BBC documentary that one!
I used to work at the firm that was partially crushed! Fortunately it was several years ago...... This road was Very Important. We have just got to hold our breath to see what happens.....
We might have to start planning a committee to evaluate the possibility of planning a study on the impact of a possible evaluation of the potential of the cost of the planning organization of the impact evaluation.
Used to use that bit of road often but wondered just how long it would survive. Glad I live in the Midlands now. Jon. You’re 1:07 slipping again no wicked, sweet, awesome at the end
I used to work in Northfleet and living in stone, used this road day in day out for years over 10 years… There wasn’t a week that went by where it wasn’t being dug up for one reason or another. But it’s typical of the local councils to drag their feet over this, like they do with everything else in the area. this road won’t be sorted for years..
You used to work and live in the area, but still blame the 'local councils' when none of the local councils (Gravesham and Dartford) are remotely responsible for roads. The 'local highway authority' is actually Kent County Council.
@@Return_oftheMac I still live in the area. Stone/ horns cross to be precise. And even though you say it’s down to KCC to sort the roads out, it’s also down the the relevant councils to put pressure on KCC etc as it affects their constituencies regarding businesses home owners etc. Not to mention the relevant transport infrastructure as they have to go on bigger detours that add time and costs to their services. If one doesn’t want to listen to the others then situations such as this major through road closure will never get sorted.
@@artfulbodger78 True, but I just wanted to point out that the 'local' councils can't honestly be accused of dragging their feet. I have worked in local government before, including on similar issues, and it has always been private companies or landowners denying responsibility and gragging things out through the courts, in the hope that peopel will mistakenly blame the council and put misallocated pressure on them to fold (and shell out more taxpayers money than they should). Thames Water must love seeing people blame the Council here, anything to divert responsibility from them.
@@Return_oftheMac The locals of Swanscombe and northfleet have been blaming TW as well. That small stretch of road has been dug up more times than people care to think. It became a rarity to drive along that road for more than a week without it being dug up due to water leaks. It was like a patchwork quilt once they’d done what they needed. So it’s hardly surprising the chalk cliffs gave up in the end. But residents etc really do feel the local councils ain’t doing enough. The council’s should be putting so much pressure on all those involved to get the situation resolved because they are all fed up of the high street and small residential roads around swanscombe being used as rat runs by motorists and mainly foreign hgvs. But from experience with DBC after the big debacle years back regarding the Tesco fiasco. Most have lost faith in both DBC and Gravesham borough council now.
I used to live in Ingress park (which is quite near this) the absolute madness during rush hour trying to get around near this is maddening. It increased most journeys east by abiut 45 mins to an hour due to all traffic flowing through to the other avenues of traffic
I know this section of road well i used to visit the cement works that were there, I seam to remember there was a tunnel through it to allow access to each side of the road, first time I went into the cement works I was amazed at the road sitting up on this slender piece of chalk
The main road in the village of Hallsands in South Devon has suffered a similar fate due to an undermining by industry. Worth taking a read and then a visit Jon. Give the Saab a chance to stretch its legs and also enjoy some D-Day era roads one of which is tidal. Lovely. Have a good week.
Yes fully agree if they are found to be the culprits! ( stopping local leak repairs and increasing everyone’s water bill by 50% should be well worth it!) 😁
@@cp4512 errr, do you have shares? The idea of buying share is to get a good paying dividend, hopefully better than an ISA or a bank deposit account. If you investment contacted you to tell you they were stopping dividends, then obviously you would immediately sell those shares and move them to an investment that pays dividends. Subsequently then the water company concerned would then crash. I’m surprised you were unaware?
The B5605 just south of Wrexham has been closed for over 3 years because of a landslide. Although not a main road, when the nearby A483 gets closed (which is common due to accidents or high winds) the traffic that would normally be able to use the B5605 then has to take a 14 mile diversion
Don't expect it to be open again that quickly, there's a road near me that (partially?) collapsed in January 2021 and they're only just getting round to designing the fix, so I don't imagine it'll be fixed before 2026. This road in Kent will probably be closed until 2030, by which point they'll say that residents have done without it for 5 years and rebuilding it will cause induced demand
Hi Jon, We have a similar problem in Wrexham ( the county ) 8 miles south of Wrexham on the B5605 at Cefn Bychan / New Bridge in January 2021 after a storm had washed away the the bank where the bridge support holding the road. This road was used as a diversion route for the A483. Over 30 years ago this route was the A483 before it was down graded to the B5605 when New Bridge and Pentre was by-passed and the A483 had a new route. Great video
Seems like you could almost do a mini series on collapsed roads. I’m fairly local to the probably now infamous B5605 - Newbridge that’s been closed since January 2021 due to a landslip. Only recently have the repair contracts gone out to tender and no plans drawn up yet, as far as I know.
Another minor issue has occurred on the A226 in the area in the past few days. At least one sinkhole opened up on A226 London Road in Swanscombe (on the junction shown at 0:05), with reports of more having opened subsequently.
Have a look at the snake pass in Derbyshire that got close two years ago now they’ve reopened it to any vehicle under 7.5 tons but still not repaired. I think this excuse to stop HGVs using the road as a shortcut to Sheffield
I’m owning up to nothing after driving artics on that road for years, there’s talk of a lower level bypass going via the outside of the industrial estate. The alternative route is out to the A2 then come off a the Bean interchange towards Bluewater, this brings you out at the Blue Star junction, M25 J1, named after a cafe many years ago, today it’s a BP petrol station.
Corruption in the past is the root cause, as those who quarried the chalk should not have been allowed to quarry so close to a road with our having to pay for re-routing or rebuilding the road.
not only did they allow the landscape to remain like this but they also seemed to think a thin sliver of crumbly chalk with a road on it would make a great viaduct instead of just running the pipes under the surrounding land
One of the major delays has been the busines that was hit Lancebox and others not allowing KCC access to the site to perform investigation work. The cliff where the A226 meets the High Street/ London Road is a very steep Cliff and would not be possible to build a ramp from the ground on KCC land. Any long-term solution is going to cost millions and probably have to be a new bridge being built the cost of this could be added to the new Lower Thames Crossing which is already costing billions so a couple of million for this would be peanuts, in the meantime upgrade works to the A2260 could help relieve the congestion in the area as this leads to a large main road junction that was built to handle high traffic volumes.
I live on the other side at the bottom of the hill, and my works is on the other side, not far from where the collapse is. 5 min trip is now half hour.
What makes you think they have 'forgotten'? They all know it but what can they do with an inheirted asset and no money? The only ones that can easily pay for decent inspection and maintenance are the privatised water companies who should have not let the pipe leak in the first place. But they just care about profit and our government encourages that stance by removing funding for the regulator and reducing oversight/standards these companies should work to.
They could build a new road to the north of the area, with a bridge over the entrance to the tunnel, then knock down the old one and not bother to replace the section over the railway apart from maybe a footpath
I was just coming here to say that. The tunnel portal on HS1 can only be about a quarter of a mile north of the A226, and if you joined up the roads sensibly it wouldn't cause anything like half a mile's extra distance on most routes. It could also open up the area to the north for development. (Though not being local I don't know whether that is desirable.) The existing route could be retained for pedestrians, cyclists, mobility scooters etc.
I would have thought that building a retaining wall there, essentially replacing the building that's been collapsed onto would be quite straightforward. That looks like 3 or 4 (let's say 4) 40' long containers x 4 high (so 16 in total. Fill them full of concrete. Gabian basket type stuff
Here is an idea for solving the problem: 1) Instead of demolishing the entire line of chalk, chop down several small sections from road level to surface level, 2) Build foundations at the new ground level, 3) Erect bridge supports that take the road back up to the current (original surface) height, 4) Slide in a bridge deck along the current road surface, 5) Dig out the chalk below the bridge deck to lower it down onto the new bridge supports, 6) Reopen the road and 7) Carefully dig out the rest of the chalk, after the bridge is open. The sale of the chalk should hopefully offset some of the costs of replacing the road with a bridge. And the extra land, below the new bridge can either be used to make roads under the A226 or rented out to the people who own the land next to the current road. (The bridge would presumably need to be a double-decker bridge, with the lower level being used for water pipes, communications cables, etc.)
Who's gonna buy the chalk? The chalk pits closed for a reason, and that reason is that nobody wanted that chalk anymore (for the price they could offer).
How a thin wall of chalk has been allowed to remain a road is the most amazing part.
Safety margin was not a thing in past and safety in general was not first thing to consider.
Not sure what's worse the thin chalk wall or the extremely stupid water mains pipe location !
Also, how it managed to survive as long as it did without significant issue is amazing too
@@geoffsclassiccars Water mains are laid under roads as only the one permission required' not many from many different Landowners.
@@tonys1636 thank you that's interesting! I was thinking from the point who approved planning permission for/surveyed location of the pipes although I understand choice would be limited
Slight irony that the road demolished the building owned by a demolition company.
i was thinking that too
I used to work there! Fortunately several years ago.....
It also dumped a load of used tyres behind their toilet block.
> 1:01 < Lancebox Group
Best fact I know as being not far away from here is the locals actually held a birthday party once the road passed the first anniversary of the collapse
happened on a closed road here in Swindon after lockdown. short bit of road closed for over a year then took another year to finish
How British 😊
heard about that lmao
What did the road wish for?
the collapsed road is still better than 99% of Kent roads
I think Luton Road in Chatham is secretly being quarried
Sarcasm is what makes this channel a must watch!! 👍👍
Top quality sarcasm too with an air of carefree cynicism 😊
Really !
There's no problem that can't be made worse by lawyers.
Imagine a world without lawyers.... 🙂
th-cam.com/video/uG3uea-Hvy4/w-d-xo.html
There's no problem that can't be made worse by Thames Water...
reading this comment just after the election. heck
that road is amazing or terrifying depending on if you drive off it. You cant blame Thames Water, you see they need to spend billions on shareholder dividends which are far more important than maintenance
Well you might have a point, but don't expect nationalisation to improve how these utilities are run, just after privatisation I worked on the digitising the old paper maps of the Yorkshire Water network, the maps were ancient and it was obvious that they hadn't been kept up to date or nobody had a clue where most of the pipes were, what they were made of or how long they been there.
There has been no investment in sewage treatment or reservoirs since privatisation so we don’t keep pace with the numbers of people who now live in the UK which is one reason they are full of shit. Keep costs high and maintenance low for dividends
@@tomcat2395 Exactly. Private for-profit companies have no motivation to do anything but what they're forced to over whatever drives profit. How old are these anti-nat loons? They must not be old enough to remember a time before privatization and have their head full of their sociology teacher's nonsense.
@@medler2110almost certainly that information was word-of-mouth & need-to-know but would have been thorough (though only mapped privately by the workers). It's an ancient way of preserving jobs, sacking the people with the knowledge has proved much more costly than retaining them.
@@tomcat2395indeed, paying shareholder dividends is written into several very strict laws but maintenance isn't a legal requirement at all 😢
(Although dropping cliffs on businesses carries legal penalties).
Chalk and water. Water freezes, creates cracks. More water gets in, slightly acidic makes cracks bigger. Eventually the whole thing becomes unstable and cliffs collapse (ask anyone who has lived near Brighton to Eastbourne). So safest answer - take the whole thing down and build a bridge....or leave it and one day it will fall down on its own.
This.
Solution: chalk & cheese
Yes I think they have decided to do that. (It doesn’t cost them too much just not having that road there at all any more…) just more traffic through the back streets I expect..
Problem with this will be the lawyers - Council will want water co. to foot the bill for bridge, water co. will want to remediate only. and the lawyers will go round and round like hamsters until the end of time.
@@mojonojo3 correct. That road isn’t needed now anyway and they will just bring by-pass plans forward a few years.
I live in swanscombe, me and my partner drove up that road the morning of the road collapse, there was water gushing down the road from a burst water pipe, there are plenty other witnesses to this but thames water cannot seem to comprehend how on earth it could be their fault!
Don't be daft, nothing could possibly be Thames water's fault, as long as they're keeping their shareholders happy...
Privatising water was such a good idea
I grew up in Swanscombe, took the bus to school in Gravesnd along this road for years, walked by dog in the old chalk pits either side of the road for years and awlays marvelled a the stupidity of the chalk excavations going so close to the road. The fact that nothing was ever done to support this road before this happened is insane, even though for decades it was the main route between Dartford and Gravesend before Bluewater opened and the Eurotunnel station was built and a load of new roads were built to give alternative routes.
If you don't stop with your sarcastic sense of humour I will have to keep watching! Love it.
I live in Swanscombe and this has caused nightmares with traffic, for a good 6 months before this happened we were all reporting water leaks on this section of road and Thames water did fuck all.
So somebody thought excavating both sides of the road away was a perfectly good idea, nothing that will ever have any issues ...
Victorians. Wayagunnadoo, far as they were concerned if it was a problem for poor people it wasn't a problem
You can bet they're not around anymore 😂😂😂
In chalk, that notoriously strong stone able to withstand the effects of weathering...
@@mikecrimlis3366 but our current tory government and the huge for profit companies their lot keep selling our assets too also share the 'it's going to be a future problem for poor people to deal with' stance.
@@thebrowns5337remind me of any privatised business Labour every renationalised or have promised to in the next election?
Wow haha, I was shocked to see you cover this story, This road has caused so much havoc in Swanscombe and Northfleet especially when there is congestion or an accident on the A2 which is pretty much every day. I used to use this road whenever there was a problem on the A2. And I dont see it being fixed anytime soon. 🙄
I like this video so I pressed the button specifically for that 👉🏻
This button 👎🏼?
Don't you mean 👇
I do love a specific button , so much better than an unspecified one 😂
Really!?
Real fans of this channel press the button *then* like the video!!!
Used to take about 30 mins to get to Bluewater from Gravesend on a bus, on a decent day with not too much traffic. The diversion caused by this road collapse is so convoluted, it’s now genuinely quicker to get a train from Gravesend to Greenhithe, and a bus from there onwards to Bluewater.
Not cheap but it’s probably an hour of your life not spent on a diversion that makes you wish to god you had a car.
A very unique road with a very unique problem
Thank you again Jon brilliant
As a Statutory Undertaker Thames Water should pay for their negligence in not fixing the leaks.
The drone shots for this one are great!
Whoever decided this monstrosity of landscaping was a good idea is surely suffering an endless pothole filled journey in hell.
The first drone shot made me think "Oh, just a sinkhole..." then the second side shot made my jaw drop.
For a significant portion of the video, I was thinking there was only a cliff on one side. I too was flabbergasted when I realised the reality.
Liked the "some sauces" blipvert.
What a cliffhanger that was 👍
Corny but good😂
👏
Oh look, that's were we live! Am I internet famous now? Another great video John, it was wicked, sweet, awesome!😊
They need to start a consultation on what to do with the road, that’s real progress
If you send a drone up and circle the area it looks like a piece of honeycomb where the chalk has been removed over the years in a multitude of similar places.
Being on a parish council it's not unusual for there to be wrangling when it comes down to the responsibility and upkeep of certain features. Water companies, local councils, Highways Agency and landowners usually point at each other in a Spiderman type of way.
Bloody Councils…
Fix the problem. Not the blame.
@@David_Crayford With blame comes a bill - the blame is the first thing to sort if you dont want the bill
''that would be chaos''
''the chaos began''
get this man an oscar
At last a great video explaining the dreadful situation we are in for more than a year and probably many more to come. Thank you.
My dad's business is in the industrial estate below the road and the closures really messed up their deliveries
There's a similar situation on the A635 in South Yorkshire. Some genius torched a car under a bridge. Road closed. Then opened as a traffic light controlled single lane. Then closed again. Traffic diverted through the two nearby residential and industrial areas. Heavy traffic and lots of it!
Though there had sorted that by now
As a railwayman, I'd be more concerned about the railway running south of there between Swanscombe and Northfleet on a similar chalk embankment.
The railway you show was constructed around 1999 and is HS1, or the Channel Tunnel line. They had to cut the chalk out of the A226 road and provide the bridge. Same happened to the rail route between Swanscome and Northfleet.
EEK!
Poor Cliff. That sign does make him look a bit unstable running around flailing his hands in the air as rocks fall on him from all of 2ft above.
If the material is so valuable, the surrounding area was entirely quarried away. Why not finish the job quarry away the section with the road on it, leaving a ramp at each end to join on to the bridge and the continuation of the road. Surely this would be cheaper than building a bridge and would leave the road at a convenient level for the surrounding access.
@@DM-ur8vc Nice idea but I was thinking of a ramp up to the rail bridge level.
engineers dont do simple they gotta make it so complicated and 50 tomes more expensive,. HS2 you know 100 billion over priced
The elevation change is much greater than it appears in the video, so this would be totally impractical, the gradient up to the top of the hill would be far too steep. The chalk is only valuable if you have a local use for it, such as cement factories, but they are all long gone.
@@rickconstant6106 yeh i agree but the boffins will want to do a tunnel and go under the railway then a ramp to no wheres and a bridge over the ramp and let it sit for 50 years and say ,WELL WE HAD AN IDEA A PLAN but it was crazy, so we abandoned it,, nice bridge though it won awards in its day
@@DM-ur8vc That would be fun but as we know with all councils, we're not allowed to have fun.
A similar collapse on the busy A6025 in West Yorkshire meant that the road was closed between Feb 2020 and Feb 2022.
Instead of getting on with the work to repair the road, the council seemed more concerned with finding someone else to pay for it. The delays must have cost the local economy several times the actual cost of the repairs. It was 17 months before repairs started.
I suspect there are many similarities with the apparent inaction at this site.
A very well put together piece. Brought back some memories as I used to work in an industrial unit on Lower Road, the other side of the railway. Used to drive down Galley Hill nearly every day before I retired in 2016. I always thought that to have a main road that was so constricted by excavations either side could mean issues for up keep. It would seem that is now the case. Glad I don't have to use a alternative route to get to work. They were happy days, although some of them weren't!
I just love Jon's reversal of the importance of loss of water verses loss of internet!
This road is round the corner from my work and I've lived in the area all my life, my dad remembers when they were meant to use the backfill from the channel tunnel to strengthen the cliff but put it into an area near cheriton to make an industrial estate. Alot of businesses are struggling because of this road being ruined. As far as im aware they're still arguing who's paying between Dartford Borough Council, Thames Water and Kent Highways. Oh and they're planning on redeveloping the area by the football ground in the future too so that road needs to be fixed asap
Thames water are playing the long game. Going to go bankrupt before anything happens and whoever takes over will have to pay (the government, therefore the taxpayer).
what a weird circumstance
Still enjoying the content and your wonderful sarcastic delivery. 😀
Glad to hear, thanks a lot mate!
There is a road in Leigh on Sea that has had temporary traffic lights for over a year, maybe two, due to it being on the side of a cliff, and badgers have burrowed under the road causing risk of a slip and subsidence!
This is just one part of many similar roads in the area, some of the quarrying has been backfilled with various rubbish and building and other waste, the pits Bluewater shopping Centre was built in was supposed to be reinstated after Blue Circle finished quarrying, but the local government body responsible for the mineral rights extraction aggreement couldn't find that part of the documentation when quarrying was completed also as the water table was breached fresh water from the aquifer is now being pumped 24 hrs a day into the Thames to prevent the shopping centre from flooding. Maybe next time theyre contemplating a hosepie ban, someone should turn the pumps off!
This was a main daily route for me in the lorry until it collapsed, really inconvenient if you ask me.
Locals have said the local authorities probably won’t fix it due to the cost.
There is a bridge in North wales called Llanerch Bridge in Trefnant . It was washed away in January 2021, and it still hasn’t been replaced and no time line to replace it.
Hammersmith bridge in west London closed in 2019, due to cracks. It's listed, so they can't knock it down, & they can't afford to repair it. The IRA tried to blow it up twice, if we ask nicely could someone more competent try again, then they might build a bridge fit for modern life.
Not sure why it's grade two listed, it's fugly.
Everyone is trying to get out of paying for the repairs, the water leaks could have been caused by movement of the roadway and the movement of the roadway could be caused by water leaks. However rain water has a PH of 4.2 to 4.4 so will dissolve the chalk a lot quicker than a leak of hard water......
The top is nicely sealed by the road so rain only hits the sides which will weather down over time but can easily be inspected. Water under pressure will cause serious erosion no matter it's PH. You can literally cut metal, granite... pretty much anything with water if you get enough pressure so it's easy to see how it will erode chalk, especially when left to go on for so long.
@@thebrowns5337 the number of times I've heard that one.... Roads arn't impervious to water ingress. Why do you think national highways spends millions a year on waterproofing bridge decks?
@@timballam3675 the velocity and volumes between water seeping gently through layers of bitumen and stone vs jetting out of a pressurised pipe are vastly different though. Using your example for bridge decks they waterproof them because we use a salt/grit/urea mixture to spray our roads with in winter and the small amount of this that can pass through carriageway surfacing will, over time, corrode the steel reinforcement used in the concrete deck. The waterproofing isn't there because there is a massive flow. We dont waterproof arch bridges and the oartar is not washed out from above and I can show you many bridges where, if we exposed the deck and the fill behind the abutment you would see no specific drainage, just PFA or 6n - again demonstrating water flow and volume are not much of a consideration at all. I worked for many years in a 'structure' team and bridges were our main thing.
Removing the chalk and putting a bridge over the same span is probably the only realistic long-term solution; fortunately, the entire other side of the wall appears to be empty space, so the removal could be set up so that most or all of the debris would fall that way, and not further impact the occupied lots.
"Built on a vertical pile of chalk, what could possibly go wrong". They could try and spin this, or just admit that it was always going to fail at some point and knock the whole lot down. They could use it as infill for a new road levelling out the land.
Reminds me of the Petersham Hole on the main road between Richmond and Kingston which was closed for over a year in 79/80. We had to get off the 65 bus, walk down some side streets and get on another bus on the other side of the hole. Road traffic was diverted via Richmond Park.
Thames Water, the original shitshow.
No. The original, literal, shitshow.
Traffic gets even worse when the A2 is shut and there is even more traffic on those local roads.
Very similar to the B5605 newbridge road , the old main road been closed for 4 years and no sign of repair , all traffic is going on the a5 but when there is a crash or high winds its a 10 mile diversion via llangollen
The A377 from Barnstaple to Exeter has had multiple subsidence issues, one took 3 years to finally complete another one is still there after at least 2 years controlled by traffic lights.... naturally it is full of massive potholes as well.
Awww those end credit tunes... * runs off to dig out Gran Tourismo 1, 2, 3 and 4 just to listen to the menu music *
Saw the title and thought it was the closed A59 Kexgill, commented, then I read the title. Standard TH-cam protocol.
Danke! Fascinating revelation!
Thanks a lot mate, appreciate it!
There's a similar situation down here on the south of the Isle of Wight, only replace "burst water pipe" with falling into the sea due to a lot of bad weather we had over several months. You should come down here and do a video on that. Also, the Military road here is meters away from the cliff edge at certain points as well.
Similar problem here in New Zealand with the road through the Manawatu Gorge, with several landslides and slips interfering with traffic flow. The solution chosen here is to build what amounts to a bypass.
The ferry is too expensive. It's about 10 times the price of a Scottish ferry for the same distance.
How can that be?
@@solariss452The Scottish ferries are great for Road Trip Island hopping down the West Coast 👍
Lucky for the Scottish population, the "Barnett Formula" means English's Tax payers subside the ferries, so a 30min ferry ride for car & two people is ~£16..!! Though the H&S on the ferries is a bit suspect at times.... So get what you pay for ..!! 😬
There's a section of that same road (the A3055 coming out of Ventnor) that has been "temporarily closed" for ten years now and looks like it will be abandoned to nature and never reopen. Another section of the same A road leading into Ventnor collapsed recently and looks like it will share the same fate leaving a couple of narrow and dangerous B roads (one of which is also collapsing) the only thing stopping Ventnor being completely cut off.
Worth a whole BBC documentary that one!
I used to work at the firm that was partially crushed! Fortunately it was several years ago...... This road was Very Important. We have just got to hold our breath to see what happens.....
We might have to start planning a committee to evaluate the possibility of planning a study on the impact of a possible evaluation of the potential of the cost of the planning organization of the impact evaluation.
Thanks
Thanks a lot mate, appreciate it!
Used to use that bit of road often but wondered just how long it would survive. Glad I live in the Midlands now. Jon. You’re 1:07 slipping again no wicked, sweet, awesome at the end
I used this when I lived in Gravesend, always thought it was an odd road being like a chalk bridge across the mine made valley
I used to work in Northfleet and living in stone, used this road day in day out for years over 10 years… There wasn’t a week that went by where it wasn’t being dug up for one reason or another. But it’s typical of the local councils to drag their feet over this, like they do with everything else in the area. this road won’t be sorted for years..
You used to work and live in the area, but still blame the 'local councils' when none of the local councils (Gravesham and Dartford) are remotely responsible for roads. The 'local highway authority' is actually Kent County Council.
@@Return_oftheMac I still live in the area. Stone/ horns cross to be precise. And even though you say it’s down to KCC to sort the roads out, it’s also down the the relevant councils to put pressure on KCC etc as it affects their constituencies regarding businesses home owners etc. Not to mention the relevant transport infrastructure as they have to go on bigger detours that add time and costs to their services. If one doesn’t want to listen to the others then situations such as this major through road closure will never get sorted.
@@artfulbodger78 True, but I just wanted to point out that the 'local' councils can't honestly be accused of dragging their feet. I have worked in local government before, including on similar issues, and it has always been private companies or landowners denying responsibility and gragging things out through the courts, in the hope that peopel will mistakenly blame the council and put misallocated pressure on them to fold (and shell out more taxpayers money than they should). Thames Water must love seeing people blame the Council here, anything to divert responsibility from them.
@@Return_oftheMac The locals of Swanscombe and northfleet have been blaming TW as well. That small stretch of road has been dug up more times than people care to think. It became a rarity to drive along that road for more than a week without it being dug up due to water leaks. It was like a patchwork quilt once they’d done what they needed. So it’s hardly surprising the chalk cliffs gave up in the end. But residents etc really do feel the local councils ain’t doing enough. The council’s should be putting so much pressure on all those involved to get the situation resolved because they are all fed up of the high street and small residential roads around swanscombe being used as rat runs by motorists and mainly foreign hgvs. But from experience with DBC after the big debacle years back regarding the Tesco fiasco. Most have lost faith in both DBC and Gravesham borough council now.
I used to live in Ingress park (which is quite near this) the absolute madness during rush hour trying to get around near this is maddening. It increased most journeys east by abiut 45 mins to an hour due to all traffic flowing through to the other avenues of traffic
I know this section of road well i used to visit the cement works that were there, I seam to remember there was a tunnel through it to allow access to each side of the road, first time I went into the cement works I was amazed at the road sitting up on this slender piece of chalk
Another brilliant and informative video Jon.
The main road in the village of Hallsands in South Devon has suffered a similar fate due to an undermining by industry. Worth taking a read and then a visit Jon. Give the Saab a chance to stretch its legs and also enjoy some D-Day era roads one of which is tidal. Lovely. Have a good week.
Surely the water company should pay for the repairs…….. and pay compensation to anyone affected until the do pay to repair it.
Yes fully agree if they are found to be the culprits! ( stopping local leak repairs and increasing everyone’s water bill by 50% should be well worth it!) 😁
@@philtucker1224 naah, just stop the payment of dividends to shareholders. That would more than cover that repair.
@@cp4512 errr, do you have shares? The idea of buying share is to get a good paying dividend, hopefully better than an ISA or a bank deposit account. If you investment contacted you to tell you they were stopping dividends, then obviously you would immediately sell those shares and move them to an investment that pays dividends. Subsequently then the water company concerned would then crash. I’m surprised you were unaware?
The B5605 just south of Wrexham has been closed for over 3 years because of a landslide. Although not a main road, when the nearby A483 gets closed (which is common due to accidents or high winds) the traffic that would normally be able to use the B5605 then has to take a 14 mile diversion
This is the best video I've ever seen about anything
Don't expect it to be open again that quickly, there's a road near me that (partially?) collapsed in January 2021 and they're only just getting round to designing the fix, so I don't imagine it'll be fixed before 2026. This road in Kent will probably be closed until 2030, by which point they'll say that residents have done without it for 5 years and rebuilding it will cause induced demand
Your forgetting that the road mentioned in this video is in the South East of England!!!! Not just outside of a small North Wales Town.....
Hi Jon, We have a similar problem in Wrexham ( the county ) 8 miles south of Wrexham on the B5605 at Cefn Bychan / New Bridge in January 2021 after a storm had washed away the the bank where the bridge support holding the road. This road was used as a diversion route for the A483. Over 30 years ago this route was the A483 before it was down graded to the B5605 when New Bridge and Pentre was by-passed and the A483 had a new route. Great video
Seems like you could almost do a mini series on collapsed roads. I’m fairly local to the probably now infamous B5605 - Newbridge that’s been closed since January 2021 due to a landslip. Only recently have the repair contracts gone out to tender and no plans drawn up yet, as far as I know.
Another minor issue has occurred on the A226 in the area in the past few days. At least one sinkhole opened up on A226 London Road in Swanscombe (on the junction shown at 0:05), with reports of more having opened subsequently.
Have a look at the snake pass in Derbyshire that got close two years ago now they’ve reopened it to any vehicle under 7.5 tons but still not repaired. I think this excuse to stop HGVs using the road as a shortcut to Sheffield
thanks for the video and also thanks for the gt4 music at the end
What a weird road! Will need to have a look when I am in the area
We've had a few collapses in margate . Normally because of southern waters burst pipes 😢
I’m owning up to nothing after driving artics on that road for years, there’s talk of a lower level bypass going via the outside of the industrial estate.
The alternative route is out to the A2 then come off a the Bean interchange towards Bluewater, this brings you out at the Blue Star junction, M25 J1, named after a cafe many years ago, today it’s a BP petrol station.
Corruption in the past is the root cause, as those who quarried the chalk should not have been allowed to quarry so close to a road with our having to pay for re-routing or rebuilding the road.
Thank you for these Educational videos
not only did they allow the landscape to remain like this but they also seemed to think a thin sliver of crumbly chalk with a road on it would make a great viaduct instead of just running the pipes under the surrounding land
One of the major delays has been the busines that was hit Lancebox and others not allowing KCC access to the site to perform investigation work. The cliff where the A226 meets the High Street/ London Road is a very steep Cliff and would not be possible to build a ramp from the ground on KCC land. Any long-term solution is going to cost millions and probably have to be a new bridge being built the cost of this could be added to the new Lower Thames Crossing which is already costing billions so a couple of million for this would be peanuts, in the meantime upgrade works to the A2260 could help relieve the congestion in the area as this leads to a large main road junction that was built to handle high traffic volumes.
I am glad you recorded the sauces about of the road closure 😂
That’s funny you’re there… I was there when it collapsed and I’d driven over it the day before it fell. The water pipe was leaking for MONTHS lol.
2 obvious things here, decline of the water network and decline of the maintenance of our roads network
all while taxes on the poorer folk in the UK and our national debt have gone up.
Can't wait for the general election.
I live on the other side at the bottom of the hill, and my works is on the other side, not far from where the collapse is. 5 min trip is now half hour.
Great. Love your sauce.
Thanks John, another great video.
Hello John, happy days, roads closed for over a year, who would have thought 😂
I’ve been there!! Always wondered what the road works were about. I guess mystery solved!!
Gran Turismo music as the end theme ❤❤❤❤
They also have the issue of gaining access from the bottom apparently from the industrial estate great vid by the way
The "experts" seem to have forgotten that chalk is water soluble, not solid, like granite.
Well….it’s porous and relatively soft as rock goes. It isn’t water soluble……
What makes you think they have 'forgotten'? They all know it but what can they do with an inheirted asset and no money? The only ones that can easily pay for decent inspection and maintenance are the privatised water companies who should have not let the pipe leak in the first place. But they just care about profit and our government encourages that stance by removing funding for the regulator and reducing oversight/standards these companies should work to.
They could build a new road to the north of the area, with a bridge over the entrance to the tunnel, then knock down the old one and not bother to replace the section over the railway apart from maybe a footpath
I was just coming here to say that. The tunnel portal on HS1 can only be about a quarter of a mile north of the A226, and if you joined up the roads sensibly it wouldn't cause anything like half a mile's extra distance on most routes. It could also open up the area to the north for development. (Though not being local I don't know whether that is desirable.) The existing route could be retained for pedestrians, cyclists, mobility scooters etc.
I would have thought that building a retaining wall there, essentially replacing the building that's been collapsed onto would be quite straightforward. That looks like 3 or 4 (let's say 4) 40' long containers x 4 high (so 16 in total. Fill them full of concrete. Gabian basket type stuff
That road is crazy, imagine crashing off the edge. With the ability for many crashes to happen on straights these days
0:44 - Wow - That was a lot of land cut away to build the industrial estates.
Replace it with gently sloping graded land.
Wow what an absurd road, I had no idea it even existed.
Like the little subtitle clip of some sauce
Here is an idea for solving the problem:
1) Instead of demolishing the entire line of chalk, chop down several small sections from road level to surface level,
2) Build foundations at the new ground level,
3) Erect bridge supports that take the road back up to the current (original surface) height,
4) Slide in a bridge deck along the current road surface,
5) Dig out the chalk below the bridge deck to lower it down onto the new bridge supports,
6) Reopen the road and
7) Carefully dig out the rest of the chalk, after the bridge is open.
The sale of the chalk should hopefully offset some of the costs of replacing the road with a bridge.
And the extra land, below the new bridge can either be used to make roads under the A226 or rented out to the people who own the land next to the current road.
(The bridge would presumably need to be a double-decker bridge, with the lower level being used for water pipes, communications cables, etc.)
Who's gonna buy the chalk?
The chalk pits closed for a reason, and that reason is that nobody wanted that chalk anymore (for the price they could offer).