Aerial Photography, filming, survey & inspections: Thames Valley

Case Study | Retail Bank, Oxfordshire

The Brief

This bank is housed in a Georgian mid-terrace, four-storey property in an Oxfordshire town high street, in one of Britain's oldest towns. The Branch occupies a narrow, terraced building extending between the two streets. It has the added complication of having a bus stop at the front of the bank.

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There is a tandem pitch roof with a valley housing a glass lantern roof light. The front pitch is higher than the rear. The is an access hatch to the lantern skylight and valley between the two slate pitch roofs so some maintenance is possible without scaffolding.

The Objective

The bank's maintenance company wanted aerial drone-based roof inspection and survey to:

give a clear photographic record of the roof's precise layout and condition, plus inspect and record the precise condition of:
- the two / three set of chimneys, only one is shown on the plans
- pitched roof ridge tiles
- roof tiles
- flashing
- valleys
- top 8 - 10 brick courses on each elevation
- side, rear and front walls, coping and gullies
- newly replaced flat roof (rear of building)

The benefits to the bank's facilities management company

Significantly reduced costs not only in terms of financial outlay but also in resource to manage the inspection project not just in terms of scaffolding, the various permissions to erect scaffolding in this busy high street location but also in resources to carry out the inspection and meet the various health and safety requirements needed.
Much reduced health & safety risk.
Non-invasive process with no risk to damage to the Georgian structure.
Eliminating the need to have scaffolding at all in this case on the basis of the information provided by the inspection & survey work.
Minimal disruption / footprint to the bank, its staff and customers plus the bank's neighbours and local residents / general public - Thames Valley Drones was able to precision fly from the very small footprint available from the flat roof at the rear of the building - see footprint.
Reduced survey time (40 minutes flying time in total) as opposed to man days to have an inspection team on site to provide the same information.
Provided greater access to areas where scaffolding would be extremely costly or impossible to reach.
High quality / High resolution imagery much of which would not be possible even with scaffolding.
The ability to zoom in on specific areas in individual images.
Ongoing resource for facilities management teams to use long after the drone survey is complete
Easy to repeat for this site if a more detailed inspection is required and easy to replicate for other similar sites.
Environmentally-friendly solution.

Project Method Statement

Click here to see the full project method statement for this project

Client quote

"We are so impressed by what the drone aerial imaging can achieve and the quality of the images we get from it and with so minimal a footprint, it will give our facilities managers all they need and MORE' - Client Contract Manager

The results

360 degree view of the site