Case Study: Security-Critical Surveying for HMP Manchester

20th November, '25

OVERVIEW:

Site Surveying Services were commissioned to deliver a coordinated suite of surveys at HMP Manchester, one of the UK’s most secure and historically significant prisons. The project centred on the panopticon and surrounding external areas, requiring a combination of topographical surveying, PAS 128 utility mapping, and a measured building survey in Manchester to support planned refurbishment and design work.

The infamous category A & B high security men’s prison was designed by Alfred Waterhouse, the same architect who designed Manchester Town Hall and the National History Museum in London, opened in 1868. The iconic building consists of four Grade II listed structures and is steeped in history and architectural beauty.

Working within a live, high-security prison required meticulous planning, precise execution, and minimal operational impact – all while producing planning-ready, design-grade datasets.

A Site Where Security Meets Heritage

HMP Manchester is known worldwide as “Strangeways,” but behind the notoriety lies remarkable architectural value. This dual identity brought a dual challenge:

High-security access protocols, restricted working windows, and strict site control.

Sensitive heritage conditions, requiring non-intrusive, high-accuracy data capture.

Surveying in this environment meant balancing security, precision, and preservation – exactly the type of challenge our multi-disciplinary approach is built for.

Objectives:

Our client required a single, unified dataset to inform future work around the panopticon. This included:

Capturing external levels, ground conditions, and access constraints

Locating and classifying subsurface utilities to PAS 128 standards

Producing a Measured Building Survey of the watchtower (plans, sections, elevations)

Ensuring all outputs aligned perfectly through a shared control network

The goal: provide a design-ready foundation without disrupting prison operations or compromising heritage features.

CHALLENGES

Working on a live prison site introduced several critical constraints:

High-security environment requiring escorts, tool checks, registration, and restricted access

Tight working windows to avoid operational or security disruption

Legacy infrastructure + new services, making utility mapping complex

Heritage fabric and narrow spaces requiring careful, non-invasive capture

Visibility and access limitations around the tower and enclosed courtyards

Despite these constraints, the team maintained a smooth programme and delivered fully coordinated outputs to a high tolerance.

Our Approach

Our methodology focused on accuracy, control, and minimal disruption:

Establishment of a secure, unified survey control network, enabling all datasets to align precisely
Topographical survey of the external areas, capturing levels, boundaries, surfaces, and movement routes
PAS 128 utility mapping using a combination of records analysis and on-site detection to verify existing services
Measured Building Survey of the panopticon, capturing internal layouts, tunnels, the stair and landing cores, and external elevations
Continuous QA, cross-checking, and verification of critical points to ensure data integrity throughout

By integrating all survey types under one team, we delivered a consistent, traceable dataset without the complexity of multiple contractors.

DEliverables

CAD-based Topographical drawings, levels, features, and site constraints
Utility mapping with service types, confidence levels, and coordinated layering
Measured Building Survey including plans, sections, and elevations
Unified CAD files & PDFs, structured for direct use in planning, design, and asset management
A single source of truth, reducing design risk and speeding up decision-making

Impact

This project strengthened future planning and refurbishment works at the prison by providing:

De-risked design through accurate service information
High-fidelity geometry suitable for sensitive heritage interventions
Confidence in future planning via fully aligned outputs
Operational continuity, as all works were completed without disrupting the prison schedule

In a security-critical, heritage-rich environment, certainty is everything. Our involvement ensured that both safety and structural integrity were fully supported by verified, high-accuracy survey data.

Conclusion

The HMP Manchester project demonstrates Site Surveying Services’ capability to deliver comprehensive, coordinated surveying in one of the most complex working environments in the public estate.

Where security, heritage value, and engineering precision intersect, our team provides the clarity designers, contractors, and public-sector asset managers rely on.