December 11, 2020
By Kurt Chirbas The Yuba Water Agency in Yuba County, Calif., was established in 1959 to reduce flood risk and provide a sustainable water supply to the people of the region. Yuba County has historically endured devastating floods, due in part to Gold Rush-era hydraulic mining practices that washed millions of cubic yards of debris …
The U.S. transportation construction market is expected to shrink 5.5 percent next year, driven primarily by the severe economic recession caused by the coronavirus pandemic, according to the American Road and Transportation Builders Association’s (ARTBA’s) annual forecast. Overall, the value of work is expected to drop from $294.2 billion in 2020 to $278.1 billion in …
November 3, 2020
What is the future of transportation research and what is TRB’s role in that future? Learn from our panel of experts about how the scale and scope of TRB’s activities expanded steadily over the last 100 years, and what we might expect in the transportation field during the next 100 years. Join us on Thursday, …
November 2, 2020
Geosynthetics magazine is encouraging industry experts to submit innovative case studies and other news for publication consideration. Geosynthetics delivers technical information for engineers, specifiers, landscape architects, government agencies, academics and installers. This publishing opportunity is extended to geosynthetics experts who possess solutions and case study content that will help readers drive projects forward. The articles …
October 14, 2020
By Javaid M. Alvi, Ph.D., and Jahangir J. Kabir, Ph.D., P.E The project site is a triangular-shaped property located at the intersection of Raleigh Avenue and West Liberty Avenue in the Borough of Dormont, Allegheny County, Pa. (Figure 1). The site housed two Nissan buildings, one with a showroom at the top floor and the …
October 1, 2020
For highway embankment construction By Stanley M. Miller and Drew Loizeaux A recent creek enhancement project to facilitate the passage of bull trout in Pend Oreille County of northeastern Washington state required removal of a 6-foot (1.8-m) diameter concrete culvert (Figure 1), realignment of a well-traveled county road and a new 58-foot (17.7-m) span bridge. …
By Nina J. Balsamo, John Massey-Norton, John R. Klamut, Terry Queen,Charles F. Straley and Mark R. Lehner An integrated drainage system (IDS) geomembrane, which provides both a low-permeability membrane and drainage space above the geomembrane, is being used in the final cover at a coal combustion residuals (CCR) landfill in West Virginia. Part 1 of …
August 1, 2020
By Tom Stephens and Nicolas Ruiz The Panama Canal opened for business 106 years ago and was hailed as the eighth wonder of the world and an engineering marvel. It has become the most consequential global waterway ever constructed. Since 1914, more than a million ships of all sizes have passed through the canal’s original …
July 30, 2020
On July 29, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized several changes to the regulations for coal combustion residuals, known as CCR or coal ash, to implement the court’s vacatur of certain closure requirements as well as adding provisions that enhance the public’s access to information about the management of coal ash at electric utilities. …
June 1, 2020
Compressor station gravel pad on soft subgrade By Sanat Pokharel, Timothy Yii, Marc Breault and Meisam Norouzi Infrastructure development in natural resources rich Alberta, Canada, often encounters very soft ground conditions that pose several construction and sustainability challenges to transportation infrastructure, such as roads, rails and pipelines. As the conventional construction practices may not always …
