Four water contracts, running at once.

A linear asset in a public road, a local authority that owns the surface, residents who need the road back. Across four concurrent contracts in Dublin and Co. Meath, BYNTGroup delivers new potable water mains as prime contractor — holding the programme, and delivering the civils through a specialist civils contractor.

Telecoms and water share civils and programme disciplines. Water adds its own: pressure testing, chlorination, sampling and planned water shuts.

Butt-fusion rig welding a blue water main, the pipe running away up the lane towards the crew — Fig. 1 — Butt-fusion welding the main · Ireland

The work in figures

Src — Cherrywood and Staleen – Duleek, 2026

New 355mm watermain, Staleen – Duleek2,750 m

— by horizontal directional drilling, across agricultural land1,700 m

— at up to 450 m in a single week, including a drill under a live motorway450 m/wk

— by open cut, in the public road1,050 m

New 710mm watermain, Cherrywood220 m

Trench depth through the carriageway1,750 mm

Concurrent contracts4

Cherrywood — 710mm through a stream crossing

For a large water utility provider in south Dublin, 220 m of new 710mm main replacing an existing 300mm asbestos cement main, installed by open cut including a crossing of a stream.

The stream was dammed and over-pumped so the new main could go in ahead of the spawning season, with the works monitored by the environmental agencies. Butt and electrofusion welding throughout, with sluice valves, air valves and hydrants installed as the main was built.

Keeping customers in water is what sets the sequence. The large valve assemblies that give control of the flow went in under coordinated night-time water shuts, and a temporary 250mm overland supply carried the network through the changeover, so the connection window stayed short.

Crew working in an open excavation around a blue valve assembly — Fig. 2 — Valve assembly, cross connection · Cherrywood

Close view of the 710mm cross connection fitting in the trench — Fig. 3 — 710mm cross connection · Cherrywood

Staleen – Duleek — 2,750 m, drilled and open cut

For a large water utility provider in Co. Meath, 2,750 m of new 355mm main replacing an existing 300mm asbestos cement main. 1,700 m went in by horizontal directional drilling across agricultural land; the remaining 1,050 m by open cut in the public road.

The drilling ran at up to 450 m in a single week, and the programme included a technical drill under a live motorway — a crossing taken without closing the road above it or touching the carriageway.

The carriageway works ran under a full road closure, with diversion routes and local access agreed with the local authority. A one-metre-wide planer cut the first 300 mm of the dig, giving an even trench in the existing surface. The finished trench is 1,750 mm deep: 200 mm of pea gravel bedding, the 355 mm main, and 1,200 mm of cover to the surface.

The work that makes or breaks the programme is coordination — multi-disciplined crews on the same front, full road closures held to their dates, and water shuts taken out of hours so supply is not interrupted during the day.

Tracked excavator and road planer working the reinstatement front, traffic management running down the road — Fig. 4 — Plant on the reinstatement front · Staleen – Duleek

Putting a main into service

A new main is not finished when it is welded. Each one is pressure tested, chlorinated and sampled, and only goes into service once the samples pass.

Proving it, not promising it

Delivering through a specialist civils contractor means quality has to be evidenced rather than asserted. Every carriageway reinstatement is Clegg impact hammer tested, each reading geotagged and time stamped on a tablet, so the local authority receives the evidence it needs to close out the road opening licence.

Five documented site audits a week keep the ISO trail current.

Completed carriageway reinstatement through a housing estate — Fig. 5 — Completed reinstatement · Dublin

Completed footpath reinstatement along a residential road — Fig. 6 — Footpath reinstatement · Dublin

Where this goes next

The same crews, telecomsRural gigabit in the north of EnglandCivil excavation, new poles and backhaul on a publicly funded programme — the same ground work, a different utility.Read it Civils and fibre, one contractFour kinds of work in ArizonaHolding the civils and the fibre together is what makes the sequence work. Here is what that looks like in the USA.Read it

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