Slope stability and settlement monitoring, instrumentation survey and deformation mapping — precise measurement programmes that give your geotechnical analysis something solid to stand on.
Ground moves. Slopes creep, embankments settle, retaining structures rotate, and coastal ground does all three on a schedule set by the weather. Geotechnical monitoring is how you find out early enough to act, and it depends entirely on measurement precise enough that real movement is distinguishable from measurement noise.
That measurement is what we provide — baseline surveys, repeat campaigns and instrumentation observation, reported in a form your geotechnical engineer can work from directly. And where a pure survey firm hands over the numbers and stops, our own engineers can carry them into slope stability analysis, foundation recommendations and remedial design.
Calibrated total stations, robotic instruments and GNSS on fixed reference networks, so that what you're reading is genuine ground movement rather than instrument drift or a shifting benchmark.
Atlantic ground has its own problems — soft marine clay, tidal influence, shoreline erosion, and a freeze-thaw cycle that heaves and relaxes structures every year. Programmes are designed around that, not imported from somewhere flatter and drier.
Tabulated observations, time-series plots, spatial deformation maps and trend analysis against your thresholds — a report that goes into the assessment, not a spreadsheet somebody else has to interpret first.
Monitoring cadence is the main cost lever, and over-specifying it wastes money as reliably as under-specifying it misses movement. Most programmes step through these as understanding improves.
A single high-precision epoch establishing the reference against which everything later is compared, on a control network placed well outside the zone of suspected movement. Get this wrong and every subsequent reading inherits the error — it is the one part of a monitoring programme worth over-investing in.
Repeat observation at a fixed interval — monthly, quarterly or seasonal — to build a trend. Seasonal is often the right cadence in this province, since freeze-thaw and heavy autumn rainfall drive much of the movement we see.
Additional epochs after a defined trigger: a major rainfall or storm surge, an excavation stage, a seismic event, or a reading that crosses a threshold. Cheaper than continuous monitoring and catches the same events, provided the triggers are agreed in advance.
A robotic total station on a fixed installation, observing a prism network on a set cycle and reporting automatically against alert thresholds. Appropriate where movement is active, where the consequence of failure is severe, or where an excavation is proceeding next to something that must not move.
Monitoring output is only useful if the precision is stated and the trend is legible — both are part of every deliverable.
| Measurement precision | Programme-specific and agreed at scoping. Precision is designed against the movement threshold that matters to you, and stated with each epoch so real movement is distinguishable from measurement noise. |
|---|---|
| Reference network | Control established outside the suspected zone of movement and re-verified each epoch, so a moving benchmark can't quietly masquerade as a stable ground reading. |
| Instrumentation | Installation locations surveyed and recorded; repeat observation of inclinometers, piezometers, settlement plates and monitoring prisms as the programme requires. |
| Scan-based change detection | Registered point clouds across epochs, differenced to produce surface-wide deformation maps — coverage a discrete prism network can't give you. |
| Reporting | Tabulated data, time-series plots per monitoring point, spatial deformation maps, and trend commentary against agreed thresholds. |
| Escalation | Threshold exceedances reported immediately rather than held for the next scheduled report — agreed in writing at programme setup. |
Slope stability and movement, settlement and subsidence programmes, embankment and dam deformation, retaining wall and shoring performance, and structure movement adjacent to excavation. Coastal work — wharves, breakwaters, armoured shoreline — pairs naturally with our bathymetric capability, so above and below the waterline can be measured in one programme.
It depends on how fast the ground is moving and what the consequence of missing it is. Most programmes start with a baseline plus seasonal campaigns, then tighten if a trend appears. Where an excavation is live next to something sensitive, continuous automated monitoring is usually the proportionate answer.
We survey installation locations, record as-installed positions, and carry out repeat observation. Drilling and physical installation of inclinometers and piezometers is coordinated as part of the programme so you're managing one scope rather than three.
Prisms give very precise movement at discrete points; scanning gives you the whole surface. Differencing scans between epochs shows where a slope is moving even when nobody thought to put a prism there — which is regularly not where the movement turns out to be.
Both, and this is where we differ from a pure survey firm. Our engineers can take the monitoring record into slope stability analysis, foundation recommendations and remedial design. If your geotechnical engineer is already engaged we'll simply report to them in whatever format they want.
