Burntwood drive-through - a very civil burger

It may just be a burger, fries and coke for those using the new drive through Mc D in Burntwood near Lichfield, but in June 2015 it was simply a tick on a planning application at Lichfield District Council.

IDP Architects had to design it; Fitzgerald were contracted to build it; JMS (Midlands) were appointed to provide the civil engineering specifications to make it happen; in turn appointing Polypipe for the attenuation needed on site and PDAS to design the pump.

Just a burger indeed, we had infrastructure to design, drainage to provide and roads to build.

We began by widening the access from the existing roundabout on the A5190 and re-aligning the access road. In fact, we had to re-design the whole infrastructure, creating a new entrance that was suitable for McDonald's. The car park and forecourt were re-structured to the architect's specifications.

As usual, such projects start sub-surface with the drainage. The authorities, in this case Severn Trent Water, wanted to re-use existing connections. On further inspection the drainage was too shallow and not fit for purpose. Shallow meant insufficient fall off so a pumping station needed to be introduced to pump surplus water 'up' to Severn Trent's mains.

Drainage requirements also meant that the existing car park (there had been a Tesco Express and Kwik Save there) was too flat so needed re-profiling.

To save the client money, instead of excavating it, digging out the existing surface, we built it up to create the drainage profile needed. This was achieved by planing the surface and laying Glasstex on the existing base course and beneath the new. Tensar Glasstex is specifically designed for asphalt reinforcement and repair as a Stress Absorbing Membrane Interlayer.

The pavement needed building on top of the planed surface - problem: this would have caused further drainage problems because the receiving surface was not permeable. The solution was to core through the receiving surface at regular intervals to allow drainage to the sub-grade.

In setting up the road design, JMS had to supply setting out information of the carriageway design in a digital format compatible with the Contractor's systems.


Comprehensive details of the road plan - long section - were further supported by outputting figures for each section of the road.

Severn Trent Authorities raised a further question that had to be addressed, namely their Brown Field Development Policies / Redevelopment. This requires a reduction of at least 30% in post development state of surface water.

To achieve this goal we had to provide attenuation throughout the development. Two attenuation tanks were needed, one downstream and one for the actual McDonald's site as well.

Because of the different heights of water in the system expressed as 'head' of water, a pumping station was specified to satisfy Severn Trent's requirements to ensure the maximum allowable flow rates were not exceeded.

The final hurdle was to demonstrate that these flow rates would be satisfactory once the drainage changes had been made to the site.

They were, it is, and mine's a Big Mac please.

Many thanks for the contribution from Bhav at JMS Midlands. If you would like further information, please contact Bhav Parmar on 02476 350505.

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