Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: Ben on February 03, 2021, 08:38:22 AM
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This might be a stupid question, but I have no idea who I would call to both inspect and repair a private bridge. My situation:
I have two bridges on my place. The first is the main bridge going to my house, which runs over a creek/irrigation ditch (about 25' over the water). No idea who made it, but it has a culvert pipe running underneath it and seems to be supported on the canal banks by big chunks of concrete and steel. The second bridge runs over a creek that separates my main property from my upper pasture (about 20' over the water). This was put in by the previous owner as a shortcut to that pasture (the two pieces of land are actually separate recorded properties). It is basically the flatbed trailer from a big rig that he laid over the creek with around ten feet overlap on each side of the creek bank.
On the first bridge, there's nothing wrong that I can see, but it does look like erosion from higher, faster water during irrigation season (APR-SEP) is starting to appear. Nothing serious at all, but something I want inspected just as a precaution and to do any reinforcement before reinforcement is necessary.
The second bridge, which mostly just handles cows and my UTVs (the former owner said he had taken up to D-5s across it, but I don't plan on that) Does have a couple of areas where the wood has cracked, and a couple of holes where the cows punched through, but from what it looks like, I can easily fix that myself. The main issue here is stream erosion on one side of the bridge. I probably have five or more years before i need to be concerned, but again, want to get an expert opinion on what would need to be done for stream bank reinforcement.
So long story longer, I'm both looking for someone (I would guess with appropriate engineering credentials) to do an overall inspection, then also what term I would use to search for appropriate contractors to do any work necessary. So far for the inspection, all I could find for "bridge inspection" was the big companies that do stuff like freeway bridges. Pretty much the same for "bridge repair" - just the ginormous companies that build the big bridges. Maybe that's all there is, but I was thinking, especially in farm country where there are a lot of these little, private bridges, there would be some smaller, local outfits.
Any suggestions most appreciated.
Edit: Bad grammar. When I say "25' over the water", I mean span over the water, not 25' vertically.
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See if your county engineer will moonlight or ask if they know someone. Also check with the university extension.
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Is their any riprap on either side. It's about the easiest way to combat erosion. Relatively cheap, too, if you have a source decently close by.
Brad
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County engineer or county/township/municipality road/highway department, whichever your locality has.
This information is for California, but with the way your state is being invaded I'm sure it will be applicable soon. :rofl:
https://cfins.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/RE-ALT01-2017-Private-Bridge-Crossings.pdf
My Father was a civil engineer and had contracts with a number of counties to do bridge inspections. I would occasionally go with him, or I'd go out and take photographs. Those were county-owned bridges, and holy crap some of them were frightening as all hell.
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Is their any riprap on either side. It's about the easiest way to combat erosion. Relatively cheap, too, if you have a source decently close by.
Brad
You've got to be VERY careful in putting anything at all in a waterway. The Feds can make your life a living hell in a heartbeat.
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Thanks guys. I also have to call the Idaho Dept of Water Resources regarding something else today and am going to ask them as well. I'm not in an irrigation district, but the canal that runs under the main bridge is used by a couple of them on either side of me. One of them might even have responsibility for keeping the water flowing. After big wind events, I've a couple of times had big limbs and other stuff blocking that culvert pipe and have cleared them myself (not the safest thing I've ever done). If I can get them to do it to keep water flowing to their customers, that would be nice.
I don't exactly have rip rap (lots of pit run though) but have big chunks of concrete in various parts of the property from who knows what the last guy did. They could certainly go under that second bridge. I have a bunch of quikcrete bags laying around from a project where they ended up not being needed. I was thinking about maybe stacking them under that eroding area under the second bridge.
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You've got to be VERY careful in putting anything at all in a waterway. The Feds can make your life a living hell in a heartbeat.
Posted while I was posting. Something else I'll be asking the IDWR about. Interestingly, about 50' upstream of the second bridge are at least six half-buried cars (maybe more are buried) which I guess were used in the old days to combat bank erosion. They all seem to be from the 40s-50s.
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As I said... putting ANYTHING, even natural stone, in a waterway without the proper permits can land you in a level of Federal bureaucratic and punitive hell that will make California's regulatory excesses look like a walk in the park.
When I was with the newspaper years ago Pennsylvania DNR and the Army Corps of Engineers came down like the legions of doom on a guy who altered a natural stream on his property.
He ended up paying a LOT of money to various entities.
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Ah, OK, I see we were criss cross posting.
CRISS CROSS!
Which is a great movie, by the way... Bert Lancaster and Yvonne "Lilly Munster" de Carlo.
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Posted while I was posting. Something else I'll be asking the IDWR about. Interestingly, about 50' upstream of the second bridge are at least six half-buried cars (maybe more are buried) which I guess were used in the old days to combat bank erosion. They all seem to be from the 40s-50s.
Yeah, things were a lot different prior to the 1960s/1970s. Things got a LOT more stringent when the revised Clean Water Act was passed in 1972 and with the roll out of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970.
These days if you buried a car along a stream bed like that it would likely trigger a massive remediation event and result in your shelling out tens of thousands of dollars in fines and remediation costs and, depending on how much they wanted to come after you, could result in jail time, especially if there's petroleum contamination released into the waterway.
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For the inspection, you need a civil engineer, not a bridge inspector. I work for a company that does "bridge inspection" for state highway departments. The firm is primarily a civil engineering firm (I think at the moment I'm the only architect on staff) and we design bridges, but the inspections of existing bridges are carried out according to the inspection criteria established by each state's highway department, and doesn't include erosion around the concrete abutments. An independent civil/structural engineer would be better qualified for that type of inspection.
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I'd be wary of speaking to any goobermint drone. You might suddenly find out you are in violation of a multitude of obscure rules and be heavily fined, have to remove the bridges, and not be allowed to replace them.
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While I share the reluctance to open the door to any .gov drones, it may be worth a call to your local NRCS office, since this appears to be ag related. They are non-regulatory and take that distinction very seriously. They have engineers on staff who may be able to help you as a form of conservation technical assistance. Also, I loudly echo Mike's warning about putting anything into anything that could possibly be "waters of the US", that is unless you like the idea of losing sleep while considering 36,500 per DAY fines.
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For the inspection, you need a civil engineer, not a bridge inspector. I work for a company that does "bridge inspection" for state highway departments. The firm is primarily a civil engineering firm (I think at the moment I'm the only architect on staff) and we design bridges, but the inspections of existing bridges are carried out according to the inspection criteria established by each state's highway department, and doesn't include erosion around the concrete abutments. An independent civil/structural engineer would be better qualified for that type of inspection.
It does sound like a civil engineer is my best bet to gather information. Again, forgive my ignorance, but are there, for wont of a better term, different "levels" of civil engineer? I guess I'm kinda thinking, as an analogy, the difference between a lawyer who would defend Trump, and a lawyer I need to consult for a tax question or something. A quick search again showed some local-ish civil engineering companies, but they looked like big guys versus someone who might help out a half-assed farmer. If I have to pay $1000/hr, I guess that's what I have to do, but if there is some level of independent civil engineer that would be more appropriate for my small problem, I'd like to go that route. :)
I will put off doing any redneck engineering until I hear from a professional. :laugh:
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It does sound like a civil engineer is my best bet to gather information. Again, forgive my ignorance, but are there, for wont of a better term, different "levels" of civil engineer? I guess I'm kinda thinking, as an analogy, the difference between a lawyer who would defend Trump, and a lawyer I need to consult for a tax question or something.
Yes ... and no.
Some states issue a different license to "structural" engineers than they do to mechanical, electrical, and civil engineers. Most just lump the licensing all together under the heading of "Professional Engineer" (PE). Some years ago, when I was managing a mid-size A/E firm, we hired a structural engineer out of Texas who had an SE license from Illinois. The guy was signing letters and reports with "SE" after his name, even though the state we operated in didn't recognize that. I asked him to use "PE" instead. He got pissy and said that "SE" was a higher grade and he was going to use it.
Then our major client's contact person (a PE) called the owner of the firm and asked, "What the hell is this SE after [___]'s name?"
The "SE" stopped right quick.
Like attorneys, PEs are expected to practice within their area of specialty. A mechanical engineer shouldn't design the structure of a high-rise, and a structural engineer shouldn't design the mechanical or electrical system for the high-rise. "Civil" engineering can encompass structural engineering but, generally, civil engineers do roads, bridges, sewers and septic systems, land grading, and site drainage systems. Ideally, you should be looking for a civil engineer (or civil engineering firm) that does site development and road design.
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As I said... putting ANYTHING, even natural stone, in a waterway without the proper permits can land you in a level of Federal bureaucratic and punitive hell that will make California's regulatory excesses look like a walk in the park.
I'm afraid to spit off my dock...
That could involve the County Wetland Board, Virginia Marine Resource Commission, US Fish and Wildlife, Army Corps of Engineers, Coast Guard, and maybe even a few others!
....and I'm actually pretty serious.....
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Please don't tell them I took a leak off the end of your dock over Christmas...
OH CRAP, I HEAR SIRENS!
Technically, throwing oyster shells back into the creek is a clean water violation....
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I guy east of here decided to build a pond for his horses one year. They take pictures from airplanes here and when it popped up in the picture he was in deep $hit
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Please don't tell them I took a leak off the end of your dock over Christmas...
OH CRAP, I HEAR SIRENS!
Technically, throwing oyster shells back into the creek is a clean water violation....
Generally, that's acceptable, same as hanging your butt out over the water and dropping a deuce. However, if you peed in a can or crapped in a bucket and then dumped it you are in violation of the law.
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The issue with oyster shells, as I understand it, is that they're supposed to be cleaned and sterilized before they're returned to the waters. Might not be a clean water act violation, but a fisheries issue.
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The issue with oyster shells, as I understand it, is that they're supposed to be cleaned and sterilized before they're returned to the waters. Might not be a clean water act violation, but a fisheries issue.
And if the returns were growing in those same waters mere moments ago.....
This is why people are sick of over regulation.
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I'd be wary of speaking to any goobermint drone. You might suddenly find out you are in violation of a multitude of obscure rules and be heavily fined, have to remove the bridges, and not be allowed to replace them.
This- ^^^ No good deed goes unpunished......
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I'm afraid to spit off my dock...
That could involve the County Wetland Board, Virginia Marine Resource Commission, US Fish and Wildlife, Army Corps of Engineers, Coast Guard, and maybe even a few others!
....and I'm actually pretty serious.....
We have lots of lakes here in SC. Some are state controlled, county controlled. Others ars Army Corps of Engineers controlled
The state and county lakes tend to have lots of lake houses. The COE lakes tend to have extremely few due to the onerous regulations. You can’t maintain the property so many feet from the waterline it has to be left natural. No sea walls or rip rap and maybe even no docks. In contrast when my family needed to put in a sea wall at our property on a county controlled lake not only were we permitted to do so but encouraged and they told us to go ahead and build it back to the original property line that had been eaten away by erosion. We gained 30 feet back in depth the whole shoreline.
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Thanks to whomever brought up the notion to stay away from the government. Grampster? Private property or no.
I got on this thread late. I would have mentioned that in the second post. Forty years ago I would not have said this.
Remember this. Paranoia is often the result of bitter experience.
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Have you contacted the local troll union?
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Have you contacted the local troll union?
I don't think his congressman can help here.
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This- ^^^ No good deed goes unpunished......
Hey, one size rules fit all... right?
RIGHT?
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I'd be wary of speaking to any goobermint drone. You might suddenly find out you are in violation of a multitude of obscure rules and be heavily fined, have to remove the bridges, and not be allowed to replace them.
My very first thought. Even if you're trying to "do the right thing" there's still a lot of truth in the old adage that no good deed goes unpunished.
Good luck and be careful.
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Have you contacted the local troll union?
Ha-ha, very good. With all the internet usage of the term, I forgot about the Grimm's fairly tale trolls under bridges.
(https://cdn.weasyl.com/static/media/8a/fa/b6/8afab6e7f45f5d063c94f553ec22936df5f15e38eda7b007ce64505536803db3.jpg)
Pic credit in properties
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Now you guys are starting to scare me about making phone calls.
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What really bothers me about some of this stuff is the fines per day provisions. Somebody else brushed on that and what it does is guarantee a settlement with the Agency since the potential fine adds up to enormous amounts. Easy feather in the cap of the salaried Agency attorney.
Note the "salaried."
But the per diem fines are the law, so what are you gonna do?
And those half-buried cars really scare me.
I wonder how much camo tarps cost.
)
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And those half-buried cars really scare me.
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Because that's where the trolls live?
=D
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Because that's where the trolls live?
=D
Nope. See Reply #9. The trolls live downtown.
:mad:
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Now you guys are starting to scare me about making phone calls.
Just like the Israelis, they can lock onto your signal, and the next thing you hear is the hiss of a Hellfire missle reaching terminal velocity just before impact. With any luck at all, you will be standing near the bridge and the crater ejecta will neatly fill in under the abutments.
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I thought the Israelis were sing Space Laser's now?
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I thought the Israelis were sing Space Laser's now?
"Singing Space Lasers" is a band name.
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(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Es9UjriXUAEhcMH?format=jpg&name=900x900)
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Now you guys are starting to scare me about making phone calls.
What scares you more?
Making a feeler call to the local gov about a situation that existed when you bought the property?
Or going ahead, doing the repairs on your own, then getting yourself borehogged into bankruptcy because you did the repairs improperly and without the proper permit, so now you have fines stacked on top of remediation costs on top of additional repair costs...
Or the third option, having the bridge collapse, losing access to part of your property and pissing off the powers that be because YOUR property is now blocking a waterway (see previous paragraph re: borehogging).
How does retirement in a one-room walk up apartment above a bowling alley sound because you're now bankrupt?
It's not often that I'll say this, but in this case, NOT contacting the proper governmental actors is the stupidest advice that's been given in this thread because of the potential for financially devastating consequences if you go it all hemanly and alone and *expletive deleted*it.
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I'm still going to call someone. I'm just wanting to be careful that I call someone who'll give me advice versus someone who'll put a "condemned" notice on my bridges. I'm just doing some local research on where to begin first.
Again, my bridges aren't ready to fall. I'll try to grab some pics and post them later. I expect my main bridge is in fine shape, and am only concerned about protecting it from erosion better on the upstream side. The downstream side looks like it's solid dirt rock all the way down and around the culvert. I don't expect even flooding would do anything to that bridge - I think it would have to be a major disaster to affect it, but I just want to be sure via an expert opinion.
The second bridge is also fine right now, especially given what I use it for, but I do see some erosion on one side that is safe for now, but I could see a problem starting to form some years down the road. Again, something I just want to get ahead of rather than repair after something happens.
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Executive summary: "Do whatever you want, just don't divert the stream flow".
Longer story: Man I love Idaho. I had some water rights paperwork I had to fill out, and rather than mailing it in, I decided to drive to the Idaho Dept of Water Resources HQ (in charge of all surface and groundwater in Idaho) in Boise and while dropping the paperwork off, take a chance on asking a gov official about the bridge thing and my water boundary in general. I went from talking to one agent to sitting in a conference room with three other people who did a whole powerpoint thing on the big screen. Apparently my particular issue was something they had discussed in a recent staff meeting. I live in what they refer to as "no man's land". I don't belong to an irrigation district, and my water is basically what they use to divert overflow from the districts back into the Boise river. They are required to keep that water flowing at all times.
Anyway, what I learned is that while I am responsible for making sure there are no blockages in the creeks, they also told me that because they are on my property, I can pretty much do what I want otherwise: fix my bridges, put new ones up, whatever. In fact their civil engineer, for erosion control on my secondary bridge, told me to just make it easy on myself and do one of the two methods mentioned here - rip rap or concrete, as that is what the state has used elsewhere. No permits required - just do it. Turned out they were jazzed to have a real world case scenario.
I asked if I had to worry about some fed.gov jackass coming out and fining me. He said they consider my area "no man's land" as well (for now, anyway) and I am well off their radar. Just as a backup, I also called the girl at NRCS who comes out to my place for habitat study, because I'm additionally removing some streamside trees that are growing at an angle and encroaching on my neighbor's water pump. Also no problem, and she in fact thanked me for doing it because the trees are Russian olives and they want them gone anyway and are asking me to plant willows in their place. She also said no problems on bridge work.
I don't think I would have gotten the same answers back in CA. Anyway, below are the images of the bridges. The first one is my main bridge, and you can see one side is pretty much all solid, while the upstream side has been going through a bit of erosion. I'm calling a civil engineer on that one. I was thinking something like rebar and concrete up to the bottom of the bridge, angled to deflect water versus taking it head on, but we'll see what the engineer says. At full flow, the water is maybe 6" over the culvert pipe (I marked high water points last season). On the second bridge, you can kinda see the lack of material high up under the steel portion of the flatbed. I plan on filling that gap with riprap and/or concrete, and bringing it down the sides to the water as well. At high water, the water is maybe a foot below the middle of the bridge. I'm thinking about maybe putting small cinderblock diversion walls at maybe a 30deg or so angle on both upstream sides to diver water from the banks there, but I'll probably drive the engineer over there as well, just to see what he thinks.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50909538676_41ccba2d92_c.jpg)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50909674562_63d99ce186_c.jpg)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50909672427_bd2b0fb6ea_c.jpg)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50908843368_a391f62a24_c.jpg)
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I think you had a bridge at one time, then a culvert was installed and encased in riprap & fill.
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I think you had a bridge at one time, then a culvert was installed and encased in riprap & fill.
Yeah, I guess that's not really a bridge. :laugh: More about road erosion than bridge erosion.
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I'm glad you got some official direction.
Also, thanks for the photos. A picture is worth a thousand words. Your first bridge is not a "bridge" -- it's a drainage culvert. Totally different sort of thing. Yes, rip-rap on the two upstream flanks is the way to go.
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Glad that you got the answers that you did. That really cuts down on the possibility for an OH *expletive deleted*it moment later on.
Of course, now that you've contacted the gubmint... YOU'RE ON THE RADAR, MAN! YOU'RE ON THE RADAR! :rofl:
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So an update in case anyone is interested.
I had called a civil engineer, but then he told me I needed a structural engineer. The structural engineer was out today for an inspection. He basically confirmed what Charby said. There used to be a wooden bridge there and it failed or was just worn out, so they just threw the culvert pipe in and filled things up, leaving the old bridge there as part of the fill.
The problem with that, according to the engineer, was that it did not allow them to get as good of compaction as they should. He was able to tell because when he was crawling through the pipe, he saw that the top was bowed down some. Not enough to warrant replacement, but apparently that's a sign that there wasn't enough pressure on the sides of the pipe to keep it completely circular.
He said it can actually be repaired vs replaced and get me another 20-30 years out of it. The downstream side is actually fine. The upstream side will need some kind of wire mesh for concrete, then angled forms put in, then some steel rammed into the ground, then concrete poured in to create a steep slope running up from the streambed to the top of the bridge.
I probably didn't explain some of that exactly right, but he's writing up a report with instructions for the contractor. Now it will be a race to see if I can get a contractor out before the irrigation districts turn their water on. If not, I'll need to wait until next October.
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You 'xplained it well enough I know what you're talking about. I'll be doing the same sometime in the future. The culvert pipe they used was too small in diameter and placed way too low in the culvert. And they didn't put anything on the upstream side, just bare dirt.
Plan is to go from the 12" dia. pipe to at least 18", lengthen it to at least 12' (wider drive) and raise the bottom of the pipe about 24". Right now, the bottom of the culvert is about 4' below the level of the drive, raising the pipe will allow me to fill in the deepest part of the culvert right at the drive to where it'll only be 2 1/2'- 3', which will make mowing that area a lot easier/safer. And then cover the upstream side like you're planning. Got a cement mixer, that'll make life easier.
How thick (at the thinnest part) did he suggest pouring the concrete?
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How thick (at the thinnest part) did he suggest pouring the concrete?
He didn't tell me, but when he sends me the report, I'll let you know the particulars.
I'm lucky that this pipe is 48", so plenty of volume. He told me to cut off that broken part sticking out and square off the opening. I wish my pipe was set just a foot higher. That would leave me a pool of water there to run the ag pump from for putting water in the pond or flooding one of the pastures for geese in the Winter. Right now my pump inlet opening is totally exposed. I have stuck a 12" high piece of plywood in front of the pipe before in the off season to temporarily dam it and raise the water level, but that's a bitch to remove. :laugh:
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Yeah, I don't need anywhere near a 48" pipe, all I have to deal with is rain runoff.
The pipe down the block under the street is 48", but it handles the runoff from both directions on the street (it's at the low point of ~1mi of road) and the "seasonal" creek across our property from the street behind. It's only flooded the street a couple of times, before the neighbor across the street finally lowered the level of his pond so there wasn't already a foot of water in the pipe.
Can't you dig a small-ish area on either side of the drive as a holding pond for the pump?
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Can't you dig a small-ish area on either side of the drive as a holding pond for the pump?
The problem is, and it's hard to tell from the photo, is that it would require moving the pump. That concrete cylinder partially shown on the right side is where the pump sits. The other side of it is much higher ground. It would actually be easier to dig the streambed deeper at the pump and then drop the inlet a little, but I'm afraid that would end up with somebody calling the Army Corp of Engineers, and the next thing you know, I'll be getting some kind of $100,000/day fine over something or other. =)
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True, messing around with the waterways can get "troublesome". =)
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"I wish my pipe was set just a foot higher. That would leave me a pool of water there to run the ag pump from for putting water in the pond or flooding one of the pastures for geese in the Winter."
You need to make yourself your own sluice gate. Basically a half sheet of plywood that you drop down in front of the pipe that will allow water to pool behind it. Then you can drop your pump in, take the water you want, and then remove the gate.
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So total thread necro. I am STILL trying to do this.
On bridge #2 (the blue railroad flatbed car in the photos above), I actually ended up doing that whole thing myself in DEC21. My gravel pit guy let me come out and get a bunch of demo concrete for free, so I was able to do riprap on that one and that has held up well. At the same time, I tore the entire top off that bridge and replaced it with treated 2bys, a roof sheathing layer on top of that, tar paper and rolled roofing on top of that. I was gonna just leave that as is, but the cows started destroying it pretty quick when they showed up in the Spring, which gave me the "Aha" moment of why the previous owner had road mix spread on top. So I did that too and it's holding up pretty nicely. The idea of the treated wood topped by the sheathing is that when the cows start to destroy stuff, I'm hoping the sheathing will act as ablative armor and I can just replace that before they start destroying the base layer. I think that's what the previous owner did as well, but he never replaced the sheathing as it broke, so all the railcar "flooring" got damaged as well before I ever got here. But anyway, a lot of work, but it's done and I'm happy with it so far.
My culvert road is a whole nother story. The structural engineer drew up some good plans, and recommended a contractor who could do the work. The contractor came out initially to get info for an estimate, then never showed up again. A half year of phone tag with his son, and then I learned that the old man retired, gave the business to his son, and the son just takes the crew fishing all the time and they just work whenever.
So then I get back with the engineer and he doesn't know anyone else, then I start calling around, but everyone said they don't do that kind of work. In the meantime, this last DEC, somehow so much water came down the road that one of the timbers above the culvert pipe cracked. You can see in the above photo that there's a timber that looks warped. It cracked and sank like six inches. So now I'm at the point where the original fix of pumping concrete in to fill voids and create a stable wall won't work anymore.
In desperation a few weeks ago, I called the local irrigation district, and the superintendent was super cool and drove out to my place (he lives 15 minutes away) to have a look. His district literally ends ten feet from my culvert pipe, so he actually has a reason for concern if my road collapses during the irrigation season. Anyway, he was able to find me a guy, since they obviously have a lot of culverts in their district. So the good news is that I have a guy now. He's going to tear out the whole crossing, install a new pipe (going from 4' to 5') and do an upstream concrete wall with wings to funnel the water through.
The bad news is that it's already too late for him to do the work before the irrigation season (he needs super low water and will be running big ass pumps for 48 hours straight to divert water during the wall construction). So it's gonna be NOV-DEC before it gets done. The badder news is that I just got off the phone with him and I'll be out $47K. So much for buying guns this year.
The even worse news is that I was really, really, stupid, and because I wanted to protect the crossing from more collapse in the meantime, was down in the creek most of today stacking 40 sacks of quickcrete as riprap to keep the culvert bank from degrading more during the irrigation season and possibly collapsing the crossing. Man, that was sketchy. Absolutely stupid of me to do it without a safety watch. Everytime I saw some dirt trickling when I put a sack in place, I was thinking the whole thing was gonna come down and bury me. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. At least I got my strength training workout in for the day. =D
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I would have used treated 4"x10" bridge planks on the metal bridge, then run some 2"x8" length wise for wheel tracks. The planking would last you for the rest of your life.
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"Man, that was sketchy. Absolutely stupid of me to do it without a safety watch. Everytime I saw some dirt trickling when I put a sack in place, I was thinking the whole thing was gonna come down and bury me. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. At least I got my strength training workout in for the day."
About the only thing a safety watch could do in a situation like that is tell Steve that you were thinking of him when you died in the collapse and that he'll be happy in his new home.
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Just curious...
Have you investigated how much it would cost to have the old bridge completely removed and two concrete end walls built, on which you could build a wood deck?
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Just curious...
Have you investigated how much it would cost to have the old bridge completely removed and two concrete end walls built, on which you could build a wood deck?
You mean like turn it into a bridge? If so, the engineer figured it used to be a bridge, and whoever owned the place at the time (he figures 30-40 years ago) then turned it into a culvert road after the bridge collapsed. A bridge would be okay for regular vehicles, but for stuff like belly dumps and other big equipment, I think it would take too much expensive engineering to support the weight, so the culvert road is the moist efficient option. Especially if this time it's done professionally instead of Idaho hillabilly style. :laugh:
I had asked the contractor to give me two bids - one with the upstream concrete wall and wings as the irrigation superintendent recommended, and the other with just riprap, which wouldn't require water pumps. The riprap ended up being only $6K cheaper for a much less robust wall over the solid concrete. Apparently the riprap is extremely labor intensive compared to building forms and pouring concrete. If it weren't for the need for the big ass industrial pumps and having to have workers monitor and fuel them for 48 hours straight, the concrete might have actually been cheaper than the riprap bid.
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Ah, I didn't realize that you were bringing truly heavy equipment over it.
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Meh, just build a couple of ramps.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHihGPyxe10
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See if your county engineer will moonlight or ask if they know someone. Also check with the university extension.
If Ben was in West Virginia I’d give him a friends number as he does exactly that.