Leica Captivate purchases

EDI have purchased two new Leica Captivate GNSS rovers.

These GNSS (formerly GPS) sets will enhance our survey capacity ahead of carrying out this winters foreshore survey work for the Environment Agency.

Topographic Survey – The Cornhill, Ipswich

Description: Our brief was to survey the Cornhill, the current market place in Ipswich and the focal point of the town center, prior to a proposed regeneration of the area.

Survey type: Topographical survey of the square with special emphasis on the position and level of the surround building footprints.

Survey equipment: Leica reflectorless total station theodolite and Leica GNSS with Smartnet network RTK in order to provide control to Ordnance Survey national grid and level datum.

Completion time: 1 week.

Coastal Surveying

EDI Surveys has been involved with the Environment Agency’s coastal monitoring programme since 1991 and we are currently the holders of a 5 year contract to survey profile and grid surveys on the foreshore from Grimsby to Southend-on-Sea, approximately 400km of coastline.

The majority of the work involves the survey of level profiles along fixed transect lines from low water level to a point inland of the sea defence / cliff top or dune line, with these transects being spaced at intervals between 100m and 500m.

Using RTK GNSS survey units we take recordings of the locations position, height and ground covering type (i.e. grass, mud, sand etc) every few paces. Once back in the office the collected data is processed by software to create cross sections of the coast line. When this new data is laid over cross sections of the same coast line collected from previous years we can see a graphical representation of how our coastline is changing over time. This valuable information gives the Environment Agency data to create the defence polices needed to protect us from the risk of flooding and erosion.

Watercourse Surveys

We carry out a large number of watercourse surveys each year for the purposes of flood modelling and siltation assessment. Our main client for these projects is the Environment Agency but we also work for a number of consulting engineers and flood risk assessors. The surveys might be of anything from a dry ditch to the river Thames.

A recent project was the River Fynn here in Suffolk, a 12km long section of the watercourse from the village of Witnesham to the tidal Martlesham Creek on the river Deben. The survey requirement was to produce profiles of the watercourse at 100m intervals, profiles of all structures, a long section and digital data in ISIS and EACSD formats.