Andover Link Main

As part of our planning application, we’ll submit an Construction Environmental Management Plan. This outlines how we’ll minimise our impact on the environment and local communities. 

Our contractors will follow industry best practices to manage construction sites responsibly, this includes:

• protecting the environment
• reducing noise and dust
• protecting local habitats and wildlife.

Our Landscape and Ecological Management Plan will outline how we’ll manage and reinstate our area of works to protect the local environment and wildlife.

Some areas, including trenchless sections, will need lighting for night time work. However, we're not planning to use lighting near sensitive areas such as the River Dever and River Test, to avoid disturbing wildlife. If we do need lighting, we will have measures in place to manage this, such as task specific lighting.

As part of our planning permission, we will be delivering 10% Biodiversity Net Gain — a way of creating and improving biodiversity by requiring development to have a positive impact on biodiversity. We have undertaken detailed habitat surveys of all the areas that are likely to be affected and we’re in the process of calculating the amount of Biodiversity Net Gain that needs to be delivered. Habitat enhancements should be maintained for at least 30 years.

Since June 2022, we’ve been talking with landowners and regulators about our plans, explaining the need for our pipeline and agreeing what needs to be surveyed.

We’ve worked with Test Valley Borough Council, Winchester City Council, Natural England and the Environment Agency to develop our application. This includes working with planning, environmental, landscape and archaeological specialists.

We’ve also spoken to Hampshire County Council’s planning and technical experts and will work closely with highway authorities on our traffic management plans.

To limit disruption, most of our work will take place between 7am and 6pm, Monday to Saturday. There will be no work on Sundays or bank holidays. If we need to work outside of these times, we’ll let the local council know.

We’ll build our pipeline in stages, using trenchless methods to minimise disruption where we can. As we build the pipeline, we’ll fix and tidy up each area once we’ve finished working there. Any land we use for a short time will be put back the way it was when we’re done.

To select the best route, our engineering and environment teams reviewed each segment and considered things like: 

• the length of the pipeline and how many bends it will have
• how many road and river crossings we’d need
• access routes and ground conditions for construction
• protecting ancient woodland, sensitive habitats and archaeological sites
• minimising disruption to local communities
• ground quality and flood risk to make sure our pipeline is resilient.

In areas where we need to dig trenches, work will typically last around ten weeks per section. Heavy machinery, such as trucks and diggers, will be used to create trenches and install the new pipeline. Soil will be removed and stored to create temporary working areas. 

Where the pipeline crosses under A roads or the River Test and River Dever, we’ll use trenchless techniques to reduce disruption. Each crossing will take up to five months, depending on its length.

We’ll use pipejacking — a way of putting a pipe underground without digging a trench - for river crossings. We’ll do this by digging two deep holes on either side of the river and using hydraulic jacks to push the pipe through soil and rock.

Once the pipe is all the way across, we’ll take the jacks out from the other side. 

We will also use horizontal directional drilling. This uses a specialist drilling machine to bore a pilot hole and then follows a set path, laying the new pipeline behind it. We may also use this instead of pipejacking for some road crossings.

At our site near Lanham Lane outside Winchester, we'll install a small building, called a kiosk, for new control equipment for our pipeline. 

We’ll also install another kiosk for new pumps and control equipment at our site on Micheldever Road outside Andover. From here, we’ll move the water we’ve transferred from Winchester to our customers in and around Andover through our existing network.  

We’ll use heavy equipment, such as diggers, to install the kiosks for our new equipment. The kiosks will be delivered in pre-formed panels. We’ll use a mobile crane to put them in place and connect them together before installing the equipment inside them.

The kiosks will be approximately 3.5 metres high and between 8 and 10 metres long. They’ll sit within our sites and will take 12 months to build. 

We’ll need to build four temporary areas to keep our teams and equipment safe. The main area will be on agricultural land next to the A30 north of Barton Ashes with double-stacked cabins to provide offices, welfare facilities and equipment storage for our teams.

Two smaller areas with fences will be used for storage and welfare facilities. They will be located next to the B3048 at Forton and east of our Micheldever Road site. We’ll also build a welfare area east of our Micheldever Road site with access from the A3093.

Along the route, we will have up to 13 additional temporary areas for material and equipment storage .

We’ll also need two temporary access points — one at Bransbury Lane for our work under the River Dever and one at Dean Lane for our work outside Winchester. We’ll need to remove the topsoil and lay crushed stone, concrete or brick to create a temporary access road. After we’ve finished work, we will remove the access road and put the area back to how it was using as much of the original soil as possible.  

Before construction begins, we’ll prepare a Construction Traffic Management Plan. This will detail: 

• the number of vehicle movements
• planned routes
• measures to reduce traffic impact on local roads and communities.

We may need to temporarily divert roads and Public Rights of Way around our working areas to keep people safe. We’ll let you know ahead of time and make sure the diversions are clearly signposted.