Severn Partnership Ltd

We are the UK’s rail survey specialists, trusted to deliver over 500,000 yards of route mileage a year, maximise data capture and minimise track access while improving survey speed, accuracy and safety.

Severn Partnership are a trusted partner to arrange track access, understand Pway engineering and the survey requirements for rail engineering projects. We have a proven record of delivering track survey and hundreds of bridges, tunnels, embankments and stations. Our teams can provide a one stop show for geospatial services from GPR and Utility surveys to Clearroute and deformation monitoring and platform gauging.

Geospatial Consultancy

In today’s fast paced world, it’s reassuring to know that surveying technology and workflows have advanced quickly too.

We provide expert geospatial consultancy in advance of large or complex survey projects – setting you up for success. Our Chartered status with the RICS (Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors) means we operate to a code of ethics that dictates that we act in the best interests of our clients.

• Defining survey specifications.
• Planning Geodetic Snakegrids.
• Coordinating project team activities.
• Providing on site survey teams to undertake quality checks.
• Office based data comparisons such as volume computations.
• Proving surveys.
• Acting as the ‘in house’ survey department for consulting engineers.
• Advising on visualisation deliverables to leverage value (Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, 360 tours).

Immersive Visualisation

Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and 360 Panoramic imaging – immersive visualisation enables you to get far more value from site and office data and to engage a wider variety of stakeholders beyond the usual design team, by stepping into VR, viewing sites in 360 panoramic video or simply inspecting 3D models without complex CAD software. Ask our project managers to build 360 images and video into the job specifications and consider using this data for safety briefings, access discussions or planning decisions.

GIS Data Capture

Geographic Information Systems (GIS), which are designed to store, manage and analyse data that can be linked to a spatial location, have changed the way businesses manage their assets. Using our mobile mapping system Pegasus:Two we can safely capture large volumes of accurate 3D geospatial data from the safety of a moving vehicle, whether travelling on rail, road or water. Imagery from seven onboard calibrated cameras is georeferenced to 2cm accuracy and synchronised with a dense 3D Lidar Point Cloud, creating a rich 3D geospatial dataset for interrogation by our dedicated GIS Team.

Applications:

• Asset Management.
• Business Analysis.
• Environment Mapping.
• Infrastructure.
• Cartography.
• Renewable Energy.
• Planning.

Automated Monitoring

We utilise the latest wireless technology to monitor your structural assets and ground movement to sub-millimetre accuracy. As part of our Monitoring Action Plan, we set automated alerts based on specified project tolerances that notify you of any movements as and when they happen.

Automated Wireless Monitoring – uses wireless sensors carrying the latest Mesh & LoRaWAN technology. A network of sensors installed by our team, allow us to monitor and measure any movements remotely to the highest possible accuracies, 24 hours a day in near real-time. Perfect for remote locations such as rail and tunnel environments to be accessed and monitored efficiently, without the costs of repeat site visits.

Automated Total Station Monitoring – ideal for projects that require a fully comprehensive I&M solution including Automatic Total Stations (ATS) and manual monitoring and it can be conducted quickly, efficiently and over any duration. Depending on your project requirements, we can also utilise our rail department to do pre and post baseline rail alignment surveys using our Track Measuring Device (TMD). We can then provide track alignment reporting regimes around Cant, gauge and twist along with track alignment.

Automated Environmental Monitoring – using the latest technology, our team can monitor environmental factors remotely, assuring compliance with the Section 61 agreement throughout the course of the project. Regulations and site-specific tolerances are established through an initial consultation with a specialist project manager, a designated point of contact, who will remain on-hand to advise on any complexities or complications.

Rail Track & PWay Surveys

Severn Partnership are PWay survey specialists, developing rail focussed management systems, site access planning, and survey delivery workflows since 1994.

We have surveyed hundreds of stations and bridge structures and thousands of miles of track and overhead lines over the country. Working for engineering contractors, train operating companies (TOCs) and asset owners like Network Rail, Transport for London (overground and underground), Irish Rail and Docklands Light Rail (DLR).

We use the principles of lean to cut waste and minimise track access time, benefiting both safety and project delivery. Investment in railway specific equipment such as the Amberg IMS5000 system for rapid clearance analysis gives us the edge with efficient working methodologies.

All our directors and project managers have first-hand experience of working on rail infrastructure, so get us involved early in projects so we can pass on the benefits of our knowledge because getting the right advice at specification stage can save weeks or months of costly track access time, compared with using conventional survey methods and workflows.

• The most up to date electronic instruments.
• Relevant specialist equipment.
• Experienced in using traditional railway surveying techniques.

Projects cover a full spectrum of survey deliverables from S&C and plain line to embankments, OHLE, structures and deformation monitoring.

• Irish Rail – 165 miles of high accuracy control survey, photogrammetry and structure surveys (Dublin to Cork).
• HS1 (Rail Link Engineering) in London, linking to Kings Cross and St Pancras.
• HS2 from Euston.
• Paddington approaches monitoring.
• Parsons Brinckerhoff – 205 bridge structures, tunnels and signals, topographical survey and ClearRoute sections.
• Network Rail secondment as survey advisor on the A09 speed enhancement project.

In 2014, we invested in the first survey grade mobile mapping system in the UK (Leica Pegasus:Two) which allowed us to revolutionise track survey times. Using the system to survey tens of miles per night instead of half a mile for a team. This workflow was expanded to enable scanning above and below bridge structures by transferring the scanner to be both vehicle and boat mounted.

We followed this by gaining Network Rail product approval for the use of the Amberg IMS5000 for scanning platforms. At Severn Partnership we can offer a range of mobile solutions depending upon the required survey deliverables from 2D alignments to 3D CAD, BIM or clearance profile analysis (SCO files).

3D Laser Scanning

3D laser scanning or LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) involves shining a reflectorless laser line over a surface to collect 3D data. The data is captured by a camera sensor mounted in the laser scanner which records accurate dense 3D points in space. This provides a solution for the rapid surveying of inaccessible surfaces or complex geometrical details. The data can be linked in 3D to your site grid and matched seamlessly with topographical survey plans, elevations and sections.

Laser surveying helps avoid assumptions, generalisations, errors in interpretation, problems by having the original data set to refer back to. There are many benefits.

Underground Utility Mapping

Legislation, health and safety, diversions, connectivity and the increasing complexity of utility networks, have all driven the requirement for underground utility mapping services. Detecting and mapping underground services include: pipes, cables, ducts and culverts using a range of utility survey techniques such as GPR, electro-magnetic location, manhole inspection and CCTV.

Our in-house utility detection capabilities offer bespoke utility detection surveys and consultations to meet your objectives, with benefits including cost savings, greater accuracy and one point of contact for all your topographic and utility survey needs.

• Comprehensive utility detection surveys.
• Mobile GPR.
• On site ‘mark up’ surveys.
• Drainage surveys.
• Manhole inspection.
• Compilation of existing utility provider statutory records.
• Pipeline mapping.
• Borehole and trial-pit utility clearance.
• Topographic survey and laser scanning.

Mobile Mapping

Mobile mapping involves collecting 3D geospatial information from a moving vehicle on rail, land or sea or rail. We are the first to market in the UK with the Pegasus:Two Ultimate from Leica Geosystems, enabling survey grade data to be captured in a fraction of the conventional time. This helps to minimise cost, programme and safety risk and maximise value.

We offer a fully integrated 3D mobile mapping and surveying service for the acquisition of dependable geomatic information, enabling you to manage, model and visualise your assets.

Geodetic Snakegrids

We work to either a local grid, or link to O.S National grid as required. We understand the intricacies of grid transformations, OSGB36, ETRS89, WGS84, scale factors, grids, datums and the implications of utilising Ordnance Survey digital data. A robust survey drawing is created from a solid network of survey control stations. 

For railway projects, pipelines and highways we can create a ‘snakegrid‘ to give an engineering accuracy scale factor of ‘1’ along the centreline of the survey. Perfect for railway surveys over tens of kilometers. We’ve been responsible for defining control survey grids that run the length of the country (East Coast Main Line grid ECM05).

NavVis Ivion

With NavVis, we’re one of the first companies to have an integrated workflow for mobile mapping outside (topographical), underground (utilities) and inside buildings, assets and structures. It enables extremely rapid mobile capture of 3D asset data, uploaded to a web-based intelligent digital twin which enables stakeholder collaboration, planning and informed decision making.

Ivion enables a web-based map view of multiple assets at once, so it can be used for a one-off project, or to simplify access to asset data which spans the UK or worldwide. It’s a reality capture platform to allow management of 3D scan datasets, with tools to mark-up and measure in browser, crop and download point clouds.

With a simple to use, intuitive design, benefits include:

• Improved decision making in operations, planning and engineering.
• Avoidance of re-work in construction.
• Delegated secure access for stakeholders and suppliers.
• Management, access and archiving of 3D scanned assed data.

IvionGo is an Android and IoS mobile app that allows users to log observations, issues and inspection notes straight into points of interest tagged in the digital twin. These can then become discussion points with tracked progress between colleagues. The aim is to reduce construction problems, collect improvement ideas, reduce maintenance downtime and share actual locations of assets and defects – being the definitive ‘where’ for asset data.