0115 704 3969
19th December 2019
We are delighted to announce the appointment of Nick Edwards as Principal Civil Engineer to the PJS team. With over 30 years’ working in the housebuilding sector, Nick brings a vast amount of experience in land development, detailed design and delivery of S38 highways, S104 drainage, S278 highway improvements, S185 sewer diversions, S98 sewer requisitions, external works and plot drainage.
Nick comments “Given the varied experience at PJS, I am looking forward to working with the team, learning from them as well as being able to focus on innovative designs that are both cost effective and deliverable.”
Nick spent the first part of his career working for the Technical Services Department at Bovis Homes designing large spine roads, roundabouts and drainage schemes for the regions across the UK. His infrastructure design was key to facilitating development for housing, something which we are very familiar with here at PJS. The combination of his engineering knowledge and developer experience will not only add value for our clients, but his awareness of cost and deliverability means that he truly understands the pressures clients face when preparing for land sale or purchase.
Chester Road, Malpas is an interesting example of one of the more challenging schemes that Nick has worked on. A greenfield development of approximately 145 houses which included S38 highway design, S104 sewer design, green SuDS attenuation systems, 600m of offsite surface water sewers and a surface water outfall to an existing watercourse. Adding into the mix existing assets requiring an extensive S185 combined sewer diversion, the diversion of a large diameter National Grid gas main crossing the site, S278 works requiring the realignment and reconfiguration of an existing junction, and the diversion and grounding of 650m of overhead high voltage electric line made this an increasingly complex project.
Nick recalls the offsite surface water sewer being particularly problematic as the route of the sewer crossed land that belonged to a number of different owners. This created a legal roadblock during the project pertaining to a pre-agreement with both land owner and the local water authority. In order to resolve the issue, Nick carried out a land search and quickly identified a solution whereby he was able to renegotiate with the water authority and land owners through a Deed of Grant of Outfall for the watercourse within the water authority ownership.
His solution was well received by both parties and with a slight change of alignment of the sewer and discharge point the project commenced with a clear start and end point within the control of the developer and water authority respectively. Nick’s renegotiations enabled a S98 sewer requisition notice to be served to provide the outfall through the land in the ownership of both land owners.
Nick comments “The resultant S98 offer from DCWW (local water authority), to install the outfall for us using their powers under the Water Industry Act, brought both land owners back to the table in order to secure the original pre-agreement for them to enter into Deed of Grant of Easement and Outfall.”
On Nick’s appointment as Principal Civil Engineer, Managing Director Paul says;
“PJS have grown steadily since launching back in 2017 with just three team members and now a strong team of ten. We are always keen to have talented and experienced people join us. I worked with Nick at Bovis for a number of years where we were involved in overcoming a number of engineering and planning challenges both in the acquisition land and delivery of housing developments. While Nick can continue to develop his design experience, from a consultancy prospective, he will equally be able to impart his knowledge to the younger members of the team. Nicks appointment reinforces our commitment to employing engineers with strong commercial awareness and experience of actually delivering infrastructure. This approach helps set us apart and enables us to exceed client’s expectations. Great to have you on board Nick!”
