Brenda Crudele, PE, Julianne Fuda, PE, An Ronnie Medlock, PE 2024-03-02 13:07:02
The steel industry’s emergency repair skills ensured a replacement for a flood-damaged upstate New York bridge opened within mere months.
AN EVENING STORM gripped the Town of Long Lake, N.Y., on July 10, 2023, and left damaged infrastructure in its wake.
Floods, washed-out roads, and damaged bridges and dams are major inconveniences for any municipality. They’re crushing for a remote town of about 400 in the Adirondack Mountains. Each roadway into the community is essential, and substantial road or bridge damage can usher in 80-mile detours.
The next morning, New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) inspectors surveyed bridges and culverts in the flooded area—including the State Route 28N bridge over Fishing Brook.
The bridge inspection—accessed by way of a side-by-side utility vehicle due to flooding and damage on the surrounding roadways—revealed that a dam breach just upstream of the Route 28N crossing undermined the west abutment of the bridge and created 12 in. of settlement, which damaged the superstructure, deck, and abutment. The existing bridge was built in 1932 and founded on spread footings on dense soil. Inspection results and a review of the record plans concluded that the existing bridge could not be rehabilitated and needed to be replaced.
Bridge replacement projects can typically last more than a year. This one, though, needed to be completed faster. State Route 28N is too crucial a roadway to have a temporary replacement bridge for much longer than a few months, and construction had to be done before the Adirondack winter set in, which can happen as early as October or November.
NYSDOT’s readiness and collaboration, combined with High Steel Structures’ efforts, led to completion in just four months.
NYSDOT’s Structures Design Bureau has a robust in-house design staff with experienced design engineers and drafting technicians trained to respond to emergencies. The State Route 28N bridge emergency replacement was quickly assigned to an in-house design squad, and work commenced immediately.
Work to reopen the roadway with a temporary bridge also began right away. An 80-mile detour was untenable, especially during the summer tourist season that drives the local economy.
NYSDOT and the contractor decided that a temporary Acrow bridge could be installed to span over the damaged existing bridge. Ultimately, a temporary roadway alignment needed to be built north of the existing bridge to allow for construction of a replacement. However, the temporary roadway would require importing significant amounts of clearing and fill to a remote area, adding considerably more time.
The solution for a short-term reopening was installing an Acrow truss to span over the existing bridge as an initial temporary roadway. Phase one of the project included assembly of the temporary Acrow truss and construction of temporary foundations and approach roadway work to build up the embankment that took the truss up and over the existing bridge. The temporary bridge opened to traffic on July 28, just 18 days after the flood event. While the design and fabrication of the new bridge continued, Phase two of the emergency response commenced in the field.
When State Route 28N reopened, the contractor focused on constructing a temporary roadway alignment north of the existing bridge. The highway design criteria determined the temporary offline alignment’s location, but the contractor also suggested that the offset to the temporary alignment from the existing bridge leave enough room to stage two cranes. That way, the contractor could erect both cranes and leave them in place for the duration of construction.
The cranes were used to erect the temporary bridge on top of the damaged bridge, move the temporary bridge to the temporary alignment, erect the steel beams for the new bridge and disassemble the temporary bridge. Having one crane staging area for the duration of construction saved considerable time and reduced the impact on travelers during the temporary bridge relocation.
Once the land was cleared, fill and stone protection was placed around the temporary foundations. State Route 28N was shut down the morning of August 17 to relocate the temporary Acrow bridge. Construction crews moved the temporary bridge, paved the approach roadway and reopened Route 28N that evening. At that point, demolition of the existing damaged bridge and construction of the new bridge could begin.
Phase three—design and construction of the new bridge—began soon after the initial closure. With the ticking clock in mind, the NYSDOT engineering team considered several structures that could be constructed and open to traffic before winter.
During the preliminary structural layout phase—in coordination with the hydraulic requirements and geotechnical considerations— NYSDOT engineers suggested repurposing existing steel rolled beam sections that NYSDOT owned and were stored at its Oneida East Residency, 203 miles from the State Route 28N bridge location.
The original intended use of these rolled beams was for the deployment of a temporary bridge utilizing steel beams with heavy-duty metal grate deck panels. The metal grate deck panels did not perform well during NYSDOT’s last deployment in summer 2021, so the beams were not scheduled for future deployment. Except for the metal grate deck panels, the 12 100-ft W36×160 beams were still in good condition and saved for future use.
NYSDOT designers determined that an 80-ft hydraulic opening would meet the bridge’s hydraulic needs and the 100-ft-long beams could be cut to approximately 81 ft to accommodate NYSDOT’s required 1.2 LRFR minimum load rating factor.
Additional beam length was maintained to utilize integral abutments, creating a jointless structure for increased service life and decreasing construction time by reducing the number of piles and eliminating a separate concrete pour for the footings. The beams were modified with shear studs to be composite with the concrete deck and given a coated paint system for protection.
NYSDOT knew the expedited bridge design would take only a couple weeks, but rapid steel procurement was of utmost concern. NYSDOT met with High Steel Structures July 25—15 days after the storm—to verify that accelerated fabrication was feasible and determine if High Steel could meet a September 1 fabrication deadline that ensured the bridge would be built and the concrete deck would be poured before winter arrived.
NYSDOT shared design drawings for the repurposed rolled beams and discussed the project’s specific details, such as the diaphragms, with High Steel. The original rolled beam deployment included steel diaphragms that were installed level to be used with the flat metal grate deck panels. However, in the proposed Route 28N configuration, the rolled beams supported a concrete deck with a cross slope.
Ideally, the diaphragms would be placed on a slope to accommodate the cross-slope of the deck. Using the existing diaphragms meant the deck had to be poured with variable haunches to maintain the proposed roadway profile. NYSDOT engineers were hesitant because of the additional delay risk, but High Steel confirmed it could fabricate new sloped diaphragms and deliver the repurposed beams by September 1.
High Steel also contributed several value-added suggestions, including delivering beams in pairs with pre-installed diaphragms to cut shipping costs and erection time. High Steel Structures picked up the beams from Oneida East Residency July 27 and shipped them to its Lancaster, Pa., fabrication facility.
High Steel submitted shop drawings on August 1. NYSDOT and High Steel Structures staff had a conference call on the same day to discuss comments and review the final design plans. The shop drawings were revised and approved one day later. The quick turnaround was largely due to early coordination between NYSDOT and High Steel at the onset of the emergency response.
Fast Fabrication
NYSDOT called High Steel to discuss expediting a fabricated steel bridge. When factoring in shop drawings and their approval process, fabricating a bridge like the new State Route 28N with typical beams (either plate girders or W-shape beams) and framing usually takes nine months to a year. The actual fabrication work on the shop floor, though, takes about two weeks.
High Steel knew it could support the aggressive schedule with close cooperation and teamwork and provided fabricated steel within two months. There were six keys to rapid delivery:
• Weekly Meetings – High Steel and NYSDOT met weekly in the early stages to facilitate discussion of optimal design details, material use and shop drawing development.
• Expeditious Designs – NYSDOT provided High Steel with complete designs the day after it notified High Steel of the project.
• Shop Drawing Approval – High Steel took only one week to provide shop drawings to NYSDOT, which NYSDOT approved in one day. High Steel was approved to start working in the shop within one week of NYSDOT’s call. That process included a meeting between High Steel and NYSDOT where drawing comments were presented, discussed, addressed, and approved.
• Material Procurement – NYSDOT taking available beams from a previous bridge expedited material procurement, and High Steel only had to cut them to the desired length.
It’s a testament to steel’s versatility: unused beams can readily be cut to any length needed and repurposed. Beams were shipped in pairs, helping expedite and save costs in delivery.
• Welding Procedure Approval – Welding procedures were reviewed and approved within one week of submittal.
• Painting – The beams were painted in their previous use, but the paint needed to be removed for welding and other fabrication steps before it was re-painted the same color. Local blasting and touch-up were considered, but shot-blasting off all existing paint and re-painting the girders was determined to be faster.
When questions arose, the two parties immediately discussed them by phone or conference call. NYSDOT provided verbal answers that High Steel could consider official— keeping High Steel moving with fabrication while formal documentation followed later. The trust between NYSDOT and High Steel was the most important factor in accomplishing the tightened fabrication schedule.
Construction
NYSDOT completed final bridge design and plan preparation in 22 days. Design staff prepared regular progress plan sets for all stakeholders, including the contractor, NYSDOT management, hydraulic engineers, geotechnical engineers, highway designers, and environmental staff. Those plan sets allowed the contractor to procure materials, such as pile sizes for the foundations and reinforcing bars for the abutments, while the contract documents were being finalized. Coordinating with the contractor during the design phase was crucial to ensuring everything specified in the plans was constructible in the short time frame.
The contractor contributed several value-added suggestions as well, namely the foundation installation. The boulders in the Adirondacks create difficult driving conditions for H-piles, but a drilled foundation can significantly increase construction duration. Since the bridge crosses a waterway, a minimum pile length is required to harden the bridge against future scour.
The contractor proposed a combination of a drilled and driven foundation solution that saved valuable construction time in the field while still meeting the project’s geotechnical design requirements. Using integral abutments with attached wingwalls also reduced the number of piles needed to support the bridge, thereby reducing the construction duration.
The contractor also elected to pour the integral abutment backwalls concurrently with the concrete deck, eliminating the need for a separate backwall pour.
The contractor worked six or seven days a week for the entire summer and fall, completing the new bridge on October 27, just four days before the area’s first snowfall.
The new bridge opened to traffic at 6:30 p.m. October 27 with a line of residents waiting to be the first to cross the bridge. Seeing the positive impact on the community after the devastating floods made the long hours in design, fabrication, and construction worthwhile.
Owner
NYSDOT
Bridge Designer
NYSDOT Office of Structures
Highway Designer
NYSDOT Region 2
Contractors
Tioga Construction (temporary bridge work) Cold Spring Construction (permanent bridge work)
Steel Team Fabricator and Detailer
High Steel Structures, LLC
Temporary Bridge Fabricator
Acrow
Brenda Crudele (Brenda.Crudele@dot.ny.gov) is the Director of the Structures Construction and Fabrication Bureau within the Office of Structures, and Julianne Fuda (Julianne.Fuda@dot.ny.gov) is the Director of the Structures Design Bureau within the Office of Structures, both with the New York State Department of Transportation. Ronnie Medlock (RMedlock@high.net) is the Vice President of Technical Services for High Steel Structures, LLC.
©AISC. View All Articles.