Guidance > Technical > Site Investigation

FPS Survey of Site Investigation Reports

In a survey of over 220 projects awarded between July and September 2006 FPS members found the site investigation to be so poor that in a third of cases optimum piling or ground improvement solutions could not be provided. The survey found the following:

• The most basic of information was frequently missing;
• Twenty percent of piling contracts had no borehole;
• In nearly 60% of cases there was inadequate topographical information;
• Rarely was a proper geotechnical Desk Study undertaken;
• In more than half of the projects surveyed environmental concerns dominated the investigation at the expense of the geotechnical element which was often compromised or absent;
• Information freely available was often not passed to the contractor (in 17% of contracts borehole location plans were not provided, rendering useless any borehole information).

Download the full document in pdf format