As part of an ongoing programme to improve our water supply network, we have renewed 1.2 kilometres of water main in Smarden Road, Pluckley.
This vital £700,000 investment came after the pipe burst 18 times in the space of five years, causing significant disruption to local residents.
For the safety of the public and our team, we needed to close Smarden Road for the duration of the project, with the closure being lifted for a short period over Christmas.
A number of local complications impacted our programme, including a leak on a water main along Pluckley Road, Charing, a burst water main in Bell Lane in February 2022, and new diversion routes required due to work at Thorne Estate.
Although initially expected to take around eight months, the team were able to install the water main five weeks ahead of schedule in May 2022. This allowed us to undertake additional works to reduce the likelihood of further bursts, including the installation of an additional air valve and valve control in the area.
We would like to thank the community in Pluckley for their patience and cooperation while we carried out this vital work.
Key milestones
November 2021
We started work in Smarden Road, Pluckley.
January 2022
Due to the hard work of our workforce, we were able to re-open the junction of Smarden Road and The Street more than ten days ahead of schedule at the end of January 2022.
March 2022
We reached the milestone of installing one kilometre of new pipeline.
May 2022
All new water main was installed by May 2022, five weeks ahead of schedule. We were pleased to be able to work collaboratively with BT, who successfully completed cabling work under our road closure in May 2022, helping to minimise the impact for local residents.
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