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April 14 2019 Vol. IX • No. 8
“The Nation’s Best Read Construction Newspaper… Founded 1957.” 470 Maryland Drive • Ft. Washington, PA 19034 • 215-885-2900 • Toll Free 800-523-2200 • www.constructionequipmentguide.com
Inside
$1.1B Oroville Dam Spillway Repairs Put to Test
By Rich Pedroncelli and Olga R. Rodriguez ASSOCIATED PRESS
FAE USA Hosts ‘Texas Power Days’ at Two-Day Event...10
LAX Officials Break Ground on $1.95B ‘People Mover’...17
Iron Bound Auctions Holds March Sale...72
Table of Contents ............4 California Section......17-21
OROVILLE, Calif. (AP) An epic winter of rain and snow has refilled California’s reservoirs and pressed into service a spillway at the nation’s tallest dam on April 2, a $1 billion structure that drained excess water for the first time since it crumbled two years ago and drove hundreds of thousands to flee the threat of catastrophic flooding. Water flowed down the spillway and into the Feather River as storms and melting snowpack are expected to swell the lake behind Oroville Dam in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, said Molly White, principal engineer with the California Department of Water Resources. The spring storms follow a winter that coated the mountains with thick snowpack, which state experts measured on April 2 to determine the outlook for California’s water supplies. It was 162 percent of average after heavy winter rain and snow left the state
Kelly M. Grow/California Department of Water Resources photo
Excavators and haul trucks continue to remove a temporary road just below the new spillway. The road had been used during spillway construction. The California Department of Water Resources ordered its removal to minimize water quality impacts with spillway use possible during the first week of April at the Butte County, Calif., site.
drought-free for the first time since December 2011. “We’re going from flood to drought and drought to flood with very little normal in between,” said Kris Tjernell, deputy director of the
By Cindy Riley
Paving Section ..........31-41
Auction Section ........70-75 Business Calendar..........71 Advertisers Index...........74
which is the depth of water that theoretically would result if the entire snowpack melted instantaneously. see SPILLWAY page 18
CDOT Adds Lanes to I-25 With $350M Project CEG CORRESPONDENT
Skid Steer Section ....47-67
water resources department. The measurement on a snowy day at Phillips Station near Lake Tahoe found a snow depth of 106.5 in. (287 cm) and a snow water equivalent of 51 in. (129.5 cm),
In what’s considered the fastest delivery of a project of its size in Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) history, construction crews are making steady progress on the I-25 South Gap project. The Gap is an 18-mi. stretch of Interstate 25 from south of Castle Rock to Monument. “It’s the only four-lane section of I25, connecting Colorado’s two largest
cities, Denver and Colorado Springs,” I-25 Project Team photo said Paul Neiman, CDOT project director. “Over the years, congestions, crashes and delays have increased, due to population growth and more people using the roadway. “Travel delays and trip unreliability are a source of frustration for travelers now, and will only get worse as Colorado’s population grows from five The project calls for widening shoulders outside and million to more than eight million in the inside the travel lanes for safer vehicle pull-off and next 20 years.” emergency response. This improvement also will help see CDOT page 46
with drainage.