Engineering in Chalk

Lawrence, Preene, Lawrence and Buckley

ISBN 978-0-7277-6407-2
https://doi.org/10.1680/eiccf.64072.109
ICE Publishing: All rights reserved

Design and construction of the chalk earthworks for the

A41 Aston Clinton Bypass
L.H. Burt*1 & A.G. Phear2
1
Arup, Birmingham, UK
2
Arup, Birmingham, UK
*
Corresponding Author

ABSTRACT The A41 Aston Clinton Bypass is 6.5 km long and was opened in 2003. It was the last link in the continuous dual carriageway
road that now runs all the way from the M25 motorway to the south-eastern outskirts of Aylesbury. A large cutting in the chalk at Tring
provided the bulk of the fill used to construct the embankments over the western half of the scheme. The alignment runs through the lower
part of the chalk geological sequence – through what was previously known as the Middle and Lower Chalk.
Innovations on this project included the use of the self-cementing characteristics of the white chalk for the capping layer. During the con-
struction there were detailed inspections, which included site visits by the BGS, of the Lower Chalk (grey chalk), Upper Greensand and
Gault Clay cuttings, as it proved difficult to differentiate between these materials, particularly with localised faulting present.

1 INTRODUCTION
The A41 Aston Clinton Bypass was constructed be-
tween September 2001 and October 2003, and main-
ly comprised 6.5 km of new dual carriageway from
Woodlands roundabout to a tie-in east of Tring Inter-
change, as shown in Figure 1.
itfr.63938.001.3d 3 itfr.63938.001.3d 3
Figure 1. Plan of the A41 Aston Clinton Bypass.
Aston Clinton is a village situated on the edge of
the Chiltern Hills in England, approximately 55 km
northwest of London and 5 km east of Aylesbury.
The earthworks for the dual carriageway comprise
embankment from Woodlands roundabout for 3.6km.
South of the B489 overbridge the highway then pass-
es into cutting which continues through to the tie-in
east of Tring Interchange.
The Lower Chalk (West Melbury Marly Chalk
and Zig Zag Chalk) and Middle Chalk (Holywell
Nodular Chalk) won from these excavations was
used to construct the dual carriageway embankment,
as well as the embankments serving the side road
overbridges. In addition, the Middle Chalk was used
to construct the capping layer.
Approximately 765,000 m3 of material
04/02/2018 05:14:20pm was exca-
04/02/2018 05:14:20pm
3
vated in total, with around 365,000 m comprising
Lower and Middle Chalk. Environmental bunds were
constructed using the excavated materials other than
chalk, enabling a balance of earthworks material
across the scheme.

109
Engineering in Chalk

2 GEOLOGY At the base of the Zig Zag Chalk, the Totternhoe

The route corridor traverses Cretaceous strata from
the Gault Clay, through the Upper Greensand, Lower
Chalk and into the lower beds of the Middle Chalk.
Faulting, combined with the similar appearance of
the Gault Clay and Lower Chalk had led to some
mis-classification of materials in previous ground in-
vestigations. This was only identified as the excava-
tion of the cuttings progressed and a better under-
standing of the geology and faulting became
available.
Geologists from the British Geological Survey
(BGS) made several visits to the site during excava-
tion of the cuttings to record and help identify the
strata encountered. Their findings are detailed in a
BGS report (Woods 2002) which is summarised here
and a summary of the stratigraphy from this is pre-
sented in Figure 2.
The top of the Gault Clay was exposed at the
western end of the cuttings and comprised a soft,
sandy and micaceous clay. The interface with the
overlying Upper Greensand was found to be transi-
tional over about 0.3 m.
The Upper Greensand encountered was estimated
to be about 3 m thick. It was observed as pale grey
weathering micaceous clayey sandstone, burrowed
intensively throughout, with lenses of hard sand-
stone, characteristically bluish grey when freshly
broken.
The Glauconitic Marl is the base layer of the Low-
er Chalk, and overlies the Upper Greensand. It was
estimated to be about 3 m thick. A concentration of
black and buff coloured phosphatic nodules were ob-
served to mark the contact with the underlying Upper
Greensand. It is locally cut by a fault of unknown
displacement just to the south-east of where the B489
crosses the bypass cutting.
Above the Glauconitic Marl, the lower part of the
West Melbury Marly Chalk was observed to be a
dark greyish marl, with striking superficial similarity
to the Gault Clay. Moving south-east, hard, spongi-
ferous limestones were increasingly observed within
the middle and higher parts of the West Melbury
Chalk succession.
Stone was observed as a sandy bed with common
greenish black, glauconitised phosphatic nodules.
Above this, the interbedded limestone / marl litholo-
gy continued south-east. This increasingly comprised
massive bedded creamy-grey chalk, with less fre-
quent and generally thinner marl seams.
A strong colour contrast was observed from grey
chalk to pale, whitish chalk, offset by faults, at the
approximate contact between the Zig Zag Chalk and
the overlying Holywell Nodular Chalk.
At the base of the Holywell Nodular Chalk the
Plenus Marls were observed to comprise at least
three gross lithostratigraphical divisions. A basal
marly interval (c. 0.8 m thick); massive, creamy-grey
chalk (C. 0.5 m thick) and an upper grey-green and
iron-stained marl-rich interval (c. 0.3 m thick).
Immediately above the Plenus Marls, a 0.7 m thick
interval of intensely hard, nodular chalk, overlain by
a further 0.5 m of slightly less hard, nodular chalk
was observed. This was considered likely to equate to
the Melbourne Rock.
2.1 Faulting
As described, one larger fault was identified in the
Glauconitic Marl, and numerous smaller faults were
found in the Lower Chalk formations and at the inter-
section of the Lower and Middle Chalks.
There were two construction issues that arose on
site due to the faulting, namely a difference in the
predicted quantities of materials available for re-use;
and secondly, a difficulty in identifying geological
strata due to similarity in appearance. In particular,
this was the case with the West Melbury Marly Chalk
and the Gault Clay.

110
 Burt and Phear

Figure 2. Summary stratigraphy of part of the Aston Clinton Bypass excavation as seen August 2002 (Woods 2002). Note thickness
estimates do not take account of possible repetition of strata due to faulting.

111
Engineering in Chalk

3 RE-USE OF CHALK smooth vibratory roller for the final layer (to achieve
a smooth finish, which enabled testing and further
Table 1 provides a summary of how the chalk was construction to take place).
classified and its typical use in the earthworks. The Figure 3 provides a summary of the test results ob-
classifications are based on those used in the Specifi- tained for the chalk capping layer placed in the
cation for Highway Works (SHW). works. Results falling outside the specification were
reviewed, and re-compacted where necessary.
Table 1. Material classification and use.
Material & SHW classifi- Typical use
cation
Middle Chalk
3A Capping layer
3B/3C General fill*

Lower Chalk
3B/3C General fill*

Unstructured Chalk Fill to environmental

4D mounds
* For highway embankments or environmental mounds

3.1 Capping layer

The use of Middle Chalk as a capping layer was
agreed as part of the design proposed for the scheme.
This was an innovative use of the observed character-
istic of compacted white chalk fill to naturally re-
cement and gain strength and stiffness with time
(Lord et al. 2002). The thickness of the Class 3A
chalk capping layer varied between 300 and 600 mm
depending on the founding conditions.
A trial was undertaken at the start of the works to
confirm the methods and equipment that would be
used, and that these achieved the end product specifi-
cation as detailed in Table 2.
Table 2. Specification and compaction requirements for chalk fill
capping layer.
Material classification Specification requirements
3A Capping layer Middle Chalk
Non-dispersive
18-24% moisture content
The method of compaction used to place the chalk
capping in the trial and main works included:
• 150 mm thick layers (after compaction)
• ten passes of a Caterpillar 825 deadweight pad foot
compactor for initial and intermediate layers
• six passes of a Caterpillar 825 deadweight pad foot
compactor plus six passes of a Bomag BW6 towed
Figure 3. Air voids results for chalk capping layer.
3.1.1 Drainage blanket
After the topsoil was stripped, and during the winter
period, the area where Upper Greensand was present
in the formation of the cutting was inspected.
Groundwater was observed issuing from the ground
surface at several locations. It was then decided that
in this area a granular layer would be provided be-
tween the sub-formation and chalk capping to pro-
vide a horizontal drainage path for groundwater.
There was concern that as the capping layer would
comprise chalk of low permeability, the groundwater
would not be able to dissipate otherwise, leading to
potential degradation of the chalk capping or sub-
formation.
A 150 mm layer of Class 6F3 granular capping
was placed between two layers of Terram geotextile
at sub-formation layer to act as a horizontal drainage
blanket. 450 mm of chalk capping layer was then
constructed over this.

112

3.1.2 Calcium carbonate content of Middle Chalk
As discussed above, one of the reasons for choosing
Middle Chalk for the capping layer, was the potential
for the material to re-cement. Lord et al. (2002) sug-
gest that one of the mechanisms that enable this
could be a release of calcium carbonate during com-
paction, which then provides cement for grain con-
tact overgrowth. They also identify that clay content
may inhibit this strength gain. The Middle Chalk was
therefore chosen for the capping layer due to its ex-
pected high calcium carbonate content, which would
also mean a low corresponding clay content, and
hence increased potential for re-cementing and
strength gain.
As there was little known regarding the properties
of the Lower Chalk at design stage and no previous
experience of using Lower Chalk as a capping layer,
Lower Chalk was not included as a potential source
of material for this.
During construction, there was limited availability
of Middle Chalk at times and inspection of the Lower
Chalk close to the boundary suggested that the Lower
Chalk there may have similar properties to the Mid-
dle Chalk. Samples were taken from both materials to
investigate their calcium carbonate contents and
whether there was potential for some of the Lower
Chalk to be used as Class 3A capping material. Fig-
ure 4 provides details of the test results.
Figure 4. Calcium carbonate content with varying level for Lower
Chalk and Middle Chalk samples. Note the dip of the strata (~5º
SE) and the faulting observed in the chalk have not been taken into
account when plotting the level of the results.
Burt and Phear
These results show that the calcium carbonate con-
tent of the chalk increases with relative height within
the material and that the samples of Middle Chalk
tested (which include the Plenus Marl and Melbourne
Rock sample) had higher calcium carbonate contents
(of 95-98%) compared to the Lower Chalk samples.
These values are within the range identified by Lord
et al. (2002) for the Turonian (Middle Chalk) of 95-
99%. After consideration of the results, the Lower
Chalk was not used as capping material.
3.1.3 Use of other types of capping
The original design proposal was to construct all of
the capping layer using Middle Chalk in lieu of
standard granular capping material. This option had
the benefit that the material was site won and there-
fore avoided importing material. However, the sus-
ceptibility of chalk to deteriorate in wet conditions
often restricted its use during and following rain. The
accessibility of the Middle Chalk and quantity avail-
able were also issues that resulted in around 10% of
the capping reverting to using standard granular cap-
ping materials rather than chalk.
3.2 Cuttings
South-east of the B489 crossing, the alignment of the
bypass moves into cutting. The founding strata pro-
gress from the Gault Clay through the Upper Green-
sand, Glauconitic Marl and into the Lower and Mid-
dle Chalk.
The cutting slopes in the Gault Clay, Upper
Greensand, Glauconitic Marl and Lower Chalk are
1v:3h with a cutting depth of around 7 m at the B489
overbridge.
As the cutting moves up through the Lower Chalk
sequence the side slopes are steepened to 1v:1.54h,
then 1v:1h. When the cutting moves into the Middle
Chalk the side slopes are steepened further to 4v:3h.
This was to minimise landtake and excavation vol-
umes. Catch fences were provided to stop chalk par-
ticles which spalled from these faces reaching the
carriageway. At Tring overbridge the cutting in the
Middle Chalk is around 7 m in depth. The depth of
the cutting through the Middle Chalk then reduces
through to the tie-in.
113
Engineering in Chalk
Filter drains are installed in the base of the Lower
Chalk cuttings to intercept the groundwater and slope
drainage is included in some slopes where required.
3.3 Highway embankments
The highway embankments were constructed using
SHW Table 6/4 Method 1 or Method 4 compaction
for Class 3B or 3C chalk respectively. The side
slopes were 1v: 2h for the main highway embank-
ments, and 1v: 2.5h for the higher side road em-
bankments.
The classification of the chalk embankment fill
was based on moisture content as detailed in Table 3.
Table 3. Specification for chalk highway embankment fill.
Material classification Specification requirements
Class 3B Lower or Middle Chalk
18-28% moisture content
Class 3C Lower or Middle Chalk
28-31% moisture content
Figure 5 provides a summary of the moisture con-
tent of the Lower and Middle Chalk at the point of
excavation. This shows that when dug the material
generally met the Class 3B Specification requirement
of 18-28% moisture content.
Figure 5. Natural moisture content of chalk sampled at point of
excavation.
Only the Lower Chalk (and Middle Chalk) were to
be used for embankment fill to ensure uniform mate-
rials, so it was important to ensure that the other ma-
114
terials were not included. This proved difficult to
manage on site, particularly at the start of the excava-
tion works when the wider ground conditions were
not fully understood. The Specification requirement
to test only moisture content, meant that the control
testing would not necessarily identify if non-chalk
material were being used. Additional specification of
calcium carbonate content testing of the Lower Chalk
would have been beneficial.
3.4 Construction logistics
3.4.1 Plant
The chalk (and other material in cuttings) was exca-
vated using 360 degree backactors, with an operating
weight of between 35 and 90 tonnes. This involved a
relaxation of clause 605 of the SHW.
The backactors generally loaded the chalk directly
into articulated dump trucks of between 25T and 40T
capacity. This again involved a relaxation of clause
605 of the SHW, to use vehicles with a struck capaci-
ty in excess of 15 m3. This was agreed on the basis
that the maximum ground pressure of these trucks (at
15% shrinkage) with the manufacturer’s recommend-
ed tyres was equal or less than the ground pressure
from a 15 m3 articulated dump truck in each manu-
facturer’s range.
3.4.2 Flint
Flint bands were encountered in the Middle Chalk
around Tring Interchange. The flints were generally
nodular in nature and around 100-200 mm in size.
The flint did not have any significant detrimental ef-
fect on plant excavating or trafficking this material.
3.4.3 Weather
During hot dry periods the moisture content of the
chalk was found to drop between excavation and fol-
lowing deposition and compaction. This was tested
and quantified to be around 4% for a sample of Class
3B Lower Chalk with a 5km haul. Increased moisture
loss was generally observed with longer haul distanc-
es, hotter temperatures and when there was a
breeze/wind, as would be expected.
Water was added during placement of the chalk
using a sprinkler bar, where the chalk was expected
to be close to or below the lower Specification limit.

4 TESTING
4.1.1 Testing air voids content of the chalk cap-
ping layer
Initially the air voids content of the chalk capping
layer was measured using sand replacement tests.
However, these were found to give very variable re-
sults and were time consuming to undertake. The use
of a nuclear density meter (NDM) was therefore pro-
posed to determine the insitu density and air voids of
the chalk capping layer. Measurements were taken
with the NDM in ‘direct transmission’ mode at a
depth of 150 mm. The moisture content was deter-
mined using the BS1377 oven-drying method as the
NDM does not give accurate readings of moisture
content in chalk fill. Before operation on site, the
NDM was calibrated in the site laboratory using sev-
eral readings taken on Middle Chalk compacted into
a box to a known density.
4.1.2 Saturation moisture content
Tests of the saturated moisture content of the Lower
and Middle Chalk were also carried out as part of the
works. The natural moisture content was also under-
taken on the same samples and the close correlation
between the two in Figure 6 shows that the chalk was
close to saturation when freshly excavated.
Figure 6. Natural moisture content and saturated moisture content
of Lower Chalk and Middle Chalk samples.
Burt and Phear
The A41 Aston Clinton Bypass was one of the last
Highways Agency contracts to use saturated moisture
content for characterisation of chalk. In 2005 the
SHW changed from saturated moisture content to In-
tact Dry Density, as recommended by CIRIA C574
‘Engineering in chalk’ (Lord et al. 2002).
4.1.3 Moisture content testing
One of the challenges with the testing was the turna-
round time of the oven dried moisture content tests,
which meant results were not available until after
material had been placed and compacted. The test
method was maintained throughout the works how-
ever, as it was felt to be the most reliable available.
5 CONCLUSIONS
The project used an innovative capping material
formed of Middle Chalk and this was constructed
successfully. Lower and Middle Chalk were also
successfully used for highway embankment fill. A
drainage blanket was incorporated where groundwa-
ter issue at formation level was a risk, to reduce po-
tential degradation of the chalk capping layer.
The similarity in appearance of the West Melbury
Marly Chalk (Class 3B/3C embankment fill) and the
Gault Clay (Class 4 landscape fill) made the visual
distinction between these materials difficult. The
Specification required testing of moisture content for
classification and acceptability criteria. Additional
testing of calcium carbonate content would also be
beneficial.
The insitu density testing of the capping layer us-
ing sand replacement tests was time consuming and
results were found to fluctuate considerably. Testing
was instead carried out using an NDM, although the
oven-dried method was still used to determine mois-
ture contents.
REFERENCES
Woods, M.A. 2002. Preliminary Report on the Cretaceous Strata
Exposed in the Aston Clinton Bypass (A41) Excavations. British
Geological Survey (BGS) Unpublished internal report IR/02/155R.
Highways England. 2001.Specification for Highway Works.
Lord, J.A., Clayton, C.R.I., and Mortimore, R.N. 2002. Engineer-
ing in Chalk. Report 574, CIRIA, London.
115