LaCasa Wind Texas, Drainage Structure Evaluations

Over the past 10 years, Kirkham Michael has provided reliable engineering services for one of the nation’s most prominent alternative energy producers.

For this project, the developer realized that many drainage structures in the project area would negatively impact their proposed haul routes. Kirkham Michael was hired to inspect the drainage structures along the preliminary project haul routes and to determine whether they could handle the anticipated heavy construction loads. For drainage structures perceived to be inadequate for the anticipated heavy loads, Kirkham Michael evaluated whether the routes could be temporarily modified or if new haul routes needed to be identified. Some of the temporary modification options considered included installing jump spans over large culverts and bridges and installing metal plates over small pipe culverts. Alternative routes and different truck types were also considered.

The Kirkham Michael team was challenged with evaluating a couple of unique bridge types not previously encountered. Our team reached out to the Texas DOT and obtained as-built plans, which were used to evaluate the load-carrying capacity of these structures.