Project Details

Client: Watson-Forsberg
Location: St. Paul, MN
Services: Utilities

Overview

Bolander was hired by Watson-Forsberg to perform a sanitary sewer connection at Mary Hall in downtown St. Paul. This Sanitary sewer connection was different from most in that Bolander needed to connect to an existing drift tunnel that was 45’ below the road.

 

Bolander was able to help the project’s design team come up with a constructable plan that both followed all plumbing code restrictions and would work around the many site constraints that existed. To be able to complete our work, we needed to have a high level of coordination between our subcontractors (Rescue Resources, crane services, traffic control), permitting for road closures, coordination with the adjacent hospital and Dorothy Day Place. We also needed an onsite police officer whenever we were performing our work.

 

To locate the existing drift tunnel we needed to drill into, we extensively explored, measured, surveyed, and utilized every small piece of information we could get our hands on to stake the exact location needed to drill the new 10” vertical drill hole. Our foundation crew successfully drilled directly into the top of the tunnel we were aiming for, on the FIRST attempt.

 

From there, our utility crew was able to continue work down in the 45’ deep tunnel installing new bulk heads, pipe, and concrete to get the drift tunnel up to the new City of St. Paul standards. As you can imagine, working conditions in a sanitary tunnel deep in the ground are less than ideal. It is warm/hot, confined, completely pitch black, and doesn’t smell the greatest. Working in this tunnel made normal tasks turn into labor intensive, painstaking tasks.

 

Our utility crew was able to install new pipe, haul in over (150) 5-gallon buckets of concrete (from the closest manhole that was over 200’ away) and build new bulkheads. Although conditions were tough, and the crew’s craftsmanship will not be seen by anyone in the next 50 years, they still took the time and care to install work that all of us at Bolander can be proud of! Bolander was awarded this work due to the extensive knowledge, capability, and reputation of everyone at Bolander. Our safety standards played a large role in making sure we could get this work completed in a safe manner. Internal coordination for this project was vital to the success of this project.