Westminster Bridge is the oldest road structure which crosses the Thames in central London. A structure of such historical significance requires a great deal of resources to maintain, including topographical surveys.

In 2022, Sun Hill was tasked to undertake a complete survey of Westminster Bridge. This required the combination of both vehicle and boat mounted scans, with the aim of producing a topographical survey for the top of the bridge, extracted elevations for the bridge faces, and the delivery of combined point clouds for the entirety of the bridge.

As one of the major river crossings in London, Westminster Bridge has a constant flow of traffic and pedestrians crossing on a daily basis, along with extensive river traffic travelling underneath it. This presented a challenge to survey the bridge whilst causing minimal disruption to day-to-day activities of the area.

Using this methodology, Sun Hill successfully captured 3D point clouds of the entirety of Westminster Bridge. From this, the requested datasets were extracted, and the point clouds themselves provided a permanent as built record of the bridge.

The use of the Pegasus:Two mobile mapping system allowed the survey to be undertaken without the disruption of road and underbridge closures, a key factor in a successfully survey in this key location in Central London. This methodology ensured that the survey was completed quickly, accurately and reduced the risk to the surveyors and the public, compared to traditional surveying methods.

The Pegasus:Two is completely vehicle-independent making it an excellent solution across multiple applications, whether it be road, rail or river. Sun Hill successfully utilised this flexibility of the system to capture all the required data using a single solution.