Archinect - News

The Army Corps of Engineers reveals initial coastal resiliency plan for New York City

2022-10-03T09:00:00-04:00

The federal government wants to build a massive system of storm surge gates and seawalls to protect the New York harbor region from flooding and has put forth a much-delayed plan that would remake coastal areas from upper Manhattan down to Jamaica Bay. The Army Corps estimates construction on the $52 billion project would begin in 2030 and be complete by 2044. The project must be first approved by federal, state and local officials and funded before any of the work can start.

The New York District, North Atlantic Division of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has released a 569-page report outlining a coastal storm risk management feasibility study. According to The City's Samantha Maldonado, a public comment period will be held through January 6th, 2023, as a means to help "inform the design." Maldonado also reported that the government expects plans to be finalized by 2025.

The Army Corps also released an interactive map that details individual aspects of the initial proposal, which Columbia University climate scientist Paul Gallay said will "set the tone for coastal protection and community viability for decades to come."

"We have a lot more room to advocate for environmental justice communities and truly sustainable solutions than many of the other plans would have allowed for," Victoria Sanders, a research analyst at the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, told the publication. "There is still a long road and a lot of unknowns between now a...

Department of Homeland Security is undertaking repairs to portions of border wall

2021-12-27T17:18:00-05:00

The Department of Homeland Security announced on Monday that it would begin performing maintenance and emergency repairs on areas of the unfinished border wall with Mexico that runs along Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and California.

Following President Biden’s executive order in January to halt the construction of the border wall, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is in the process of terminating the construction contracts for the projects. As part of this process, unfinished projects were handed over to the Department of Homeland Security to “undertake activities necessary to address urgent life, safety, environmental, or other remediation required to protect border communities.”

Work includes drainage remediation, erosion control, gap closures, and the disposal of residual materials, to name a few.

Extreme shifts in Lake Michigan water levels due to climate change are putting Chicago at increased risk

2021-10-27T17:33:00-04:00

The Great Lakes are often called the nation’s third coast, and the past five years in the region have been the wettest on record. While the lakes don’t exactly correlate to rising sea levels, Chicago now sits in just as precarious a position as oceanfront cities. Heavier rainfall and more frequent droughts are now causing extreme swings in the water levels of Lake Michigan and the Chicago River, wreaking havoc on the city and prompting urgent action to find a fix.

Climate change is having an increasingly marked effect on Chicago, which sits right along Lake Michigan and is dissected by the Chicago River. CNBC highlights the growing risks the city faces as one that is so vulnerable to its surrounding water bodies. In the winter of 2020, Lake Michigan reached a record high in water level due to intense rains that caused the Chicago River to overflow into downtown. The rainfall was so severe that the city’s system for reversing flooding didn’t work because the water level of the lake was higher than that of the river. Experts say this wasn’t an isolated event.

On the other end of the spectrum, seven years before the storm, the water in Lake Michigan hit a record low due to a prolonged drought. This threatened Chicago’s water supply as well as shipping.

To mitigate the impacts of heightened water levels, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, following the 2020 flooding, installed concrete barriers along parts of Chicago’s shoreline. Additionally, a...

New Orleans' $14.5 billion levee system seems to have worked against Hurricane Ida

2021-08-30T15:45:00-04:00

The $14.5 billion flood-protection system built around New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina seems to have succeeded at keeping the city from going underwater again.

The abject failure of the levee system during Hurricane Katrina was the primary cause of the devastation that eventually cost the city a minimum of 1,800 lives and over $81 billion in property damage. Ida represents the first test of the system since it was completed in 2018.

The levees were thought to have an abbreviated shelf-life thanks to rising sea levels that would require significant upgrades within the next four years. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers-led project was one of the largest infrastructure builds in history next to the Hoover Dam and Erie Canal.

Meanwhile, a protested new natural gas power plant south of Lake Pontchartrain that was supposed to protect the city’s electrical system has failed. The storm was so powerful it reversed the flow of the Mississippi River. The New York Times has more on the performance of the multibillion-dollar levee system here.

Army Corps of Engineers considers $4.6 billion Miami flood control project

2020-06-17T11:32:00-04:00

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is floating a $4.6 billion plan to protect the most vulnerable areas in Miami-Dade County, Florida, from future coastal flooding and storm surge damage. The plan is part of the $3 million, three-year Miami-Dade Back Bay Coastal Storm Risk Management Feasibility Study, which is examining current and future storm management strategies.

According to Construction Dive, "the proposed plan focuses on seven geographic areas and would include the construction of storm surge barriers with floodwalls and pump stations, as well as nonstructural measures like home elevations and flood-proofing. The plan also includes the flood-proofing of infrastructure outside of the seven areas but still within the county and one nature-based feature at a site in Cutler Bay, about 17 miles south along the coast from the city of Miami."

Army Corps awards $569 million border wall contract

2020-04-27T12:48:00-04:00

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has awarded BFBC LLC, a subsidiary of Bozeman, Montana-based Barnard Construction, a $569 million contract modification for the construction of approximately 17.2 miles of barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border in California. This adds to the $141.7 million contract awarded to the company in May for work in California and Arizona.

According to Construction Dive, the Army Corps said that the projects are being delivered in response to the Department of Homeland Security's request that the Defense Department assist in securing the southern border to block drug smuggling through the construction of roads, fences and lighting systems. The additional border wall work by BDBC is due to be completed by June 30, 2021.

Border wall planning unfazed by coronavirus threat

2020-03-30T13:51:00-04:00

The United States Army Corps of Engineers this week issued Southwest Valley Constructors a contract modification worth $524 million for design-build services on a barrier wall replacement project in Tucson, Arizona, at the border between the U.S. and Mexico. The change brings Southwest's contract amount for the project to almost $1.2 billion when combined with the May 2019 initial contract's award of $646 million for the same project.

While construction of all non-essential projects in several US states has been ordered to stop to contain the spread of COVID-19, planning of fortification elements along the US-Mexican border near Tucson, Arizona is going ahead with full steam, as Construction Dive reports.

US Army Corps of Engineers has a plan to convert hotels into “ICU-like” facilities

2020-03-23T21:47:00-04:00

In the mad dash to make up for a decades-long decline in overall medical capacity in the United States that has come into full relief during the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States Army Corps of Engineers has had to step in and help create makeshift hospitals across the country so that people suffering from the disease can receive the treatment they need.

As previously reported, states and local municipalities across the country are working to retrofit existing buildings, including bankrupt hospitals, empty convention centers, and increasingly, hotels, to meet the growing need for Intensive Care facilities.

Previously on Archinect: “NYC considers converting Jacob K. Javits Convention Center to temporary medical facility.” Photo by Flickr user ajay_suresh, licensed under the terms of the cc-by-2.0

Those municipalities are largely putting into effect a plan developed by the Army Corps that was communicated in a press briefing given on Friday, March 20th via the US Army’s Twitter acc...