Deep Foundations Institute | C.

William Bermingham Innovation Award Nomination

Charleroi Lower Guard Wall | US Army Corps of Engineers, Pittsburgh District

Charleroi Lower Guard Wall

INNOVATIVE SHAFT CONSTRUCTION IN ROCK
Lock 4 on the Monongahela River in Charleroi, Pennsylvania was
constructed in the 1930s. The lock and its approach walls are
nearing the end of their useful design life. The U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers, Pittsburgh District has planned a 10-year construction
program to replace the existing locks with two new lock chambers,
each 84 feet by 720 feet. The new locks, to be renamed the
Charleroi Locks, include a lower guard wall designed by Tetra Tech.
Construction of the lower guard wall was completed in 2012.
Tetra Techs Amir Asaidali completed an innovative design for the
new 422-foot-long lower guard wall, which is comprised of precast
concrete wall panels supported by drilled shafts. The innovative
design utilized components that can be constructed in-the-wet,
thereby eliminating the construction, dewatering, and removal of a
cofferdam. In this way, both construction duration and construction
costs were reduced. The innovative drilled shaft foundation
construction was completed on schedule and with no cost overruns.

Nominee: Amir Asaidali PE

Engineer: Tetra Tech, Inc.
Owner: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Pittsburgh District
General Contractor: C.J. Mahan Construction Company
Foundation Contractor: C.J. Mahan Construction Company
Project Completion: 2012 (final tie-in to new lock is pending)
Location: Charleroi Locks and Dam, Monongahela River,
Washington and Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania

An earlier preliminary study indicated that the shaft size required to

support and resist barge impact loads was 13 feet in diameter. The
shaft size needed to penetrate more than 40 feet in the rock to provide
adequate stability. Drilling this size of shaft over water and coring in
the rock is costly. Tetra Tech determined by using a permanent rather than temporary casing, the shaft size would be reduced from 13 feet in
diameter to 9.5 feet. Also, the shaft socket into the rock was reduced to 32 feet in depth. This concept provided tremendous cost savings and
reduced construction time. The challenge was developing a method to reliably integrate a permanent steel casing into a rock socket.

To accomplish integration of a permanent casing into the rock, Tetra Tech proposed that the contractor first install a 12-foot-diameter
temporary casing through the 10-foot depth of overburden, and key the casing into the rock about 6 to 12 inches. With this casing acting
as cofferdam, the contractor would then drill a hole in the rock up to 9 inches larger in diameter than the permanent casing at bottom of
the shaft. The contractor would then install the 9.5-foot-diameter permanent casing into the socket. To allow concrete between the rock
and permanent casing, this portion of casing was perforated with 4-inch holes at 5-foot intervals, and the casing was held 12 inches
above the bottom of the shaft. This method allowed concrete to fill between the rock and casing through perforated holes with no voids
in the concrete.
This method of integrating a permanent casing into the rock was the first use of this type of shaft, and the savings were significant. The
Pittsburgh District used an extensive testing program that included several concrete cores inside the permanent casing and between the
casing and the rock. The test indicated good concrete quality and showed that this technique was very successful for the 13 shafts that
were constructed.