Kelly Rail has commenced site activities working as Specialist SISS (Station Information and Surveillance Systems) subcontractors under the Principal Contractor Telent. Currently, a multidisciplinary team of engineers are working on the project, covering the Civils, Telecoms and Electrical works, with the hope that as the Principal Contractor provides access to further stations this team will be able to double the size of the team.
Merseyrail is an urban Rail network serving Liverpool, the surrounding Liverpool City Region, the Wirral Peninsula and the adjacent areas of Cheshire and Lancashire.
Acting as the network operator, Merseyrail is one of the most punctual and reliable rail networks in the UK, with consistently high scores for passenger satisfaction and national award wins for customer service. The self-contained network operates over 600 regular services per day, every 15 minutes, to 68 stations throughout the Liverpool City Region.
The purpose of this project is to remove the life-expired, unreliable assets and introduce new CCTV (Closed Circuit Television) equipment and CIS (Customer Information Screens) displays at 27 specific sites, this project will enhance the overall experience for the passengers whilst also releasing critically needed spares required for stations out of scope of this remit.
The introduction of the new ‘IP’ based CCTV camera technology, with enhanced image quality, which given the current passenger volumes and modern-day threat levels will help Merseyrail deliver the station security levels required.
To minimise the disruption to the network and subsequently support Merseyrail in continuing to deliver high scores for passenger satisfaction, Kelly Rail has committed to working on 2 stations at a time, with the idea being to complete them and move on to the next down the line. To date, we have managed to successfully complete the works at 5 of the 27 stations and have handed these back to Merseyrail for the public to enjoy.
Like most projects this scheme came with its challenges, with inconsistent and incorrect designs and materials from the outset that has caused the program to slip, however, due to the collaborative approach by both the Kelly Rail and Telent teams on-site, Kelly Rail has managed to overcome many of these by implementing site-level buildability surveys to ensure the existing designs and equipment are fit for purpose. Due to this perseverance, Kelly Rail is still on track to complete the works by March 2022.
