Our Virginia State Police Driver Training Facility project in Blackstone experienced schedule delays associated with excess rock. The extra time spent blasting and manipulating the rock pushed the rough grading activities into the winter when the native clay soils were too wet to place. Enter Slurry Pavers and their specialized equipment to the rescue. By working with the geotechnical engineer, a site specific plan was assembled to mix Calciment into each lift of soil to allow successive lifts to be placed, compacted and readied to receive additional fills.

With nearly ten miles of roadway scattered over 684 acres and multiple driving courses, we needed a reliable plan to minimize delays and avoid mothballing production until spring.

Below is a typical roadway with above optimum moisture problems prior to treatments.

The prepared subgrade then receives a surface treatment of Claciment as shown below.

The Calciment product is hydrated to activate the chemical process responsible for binding the soil.

Specialized equipment then tills the material into a 12-inch layer to create a consistent mix.

The end result is a modified soil with enhanced characteristics ready for successful compaction.

Notice the consistency and properties of the resulting soil versus the original saturated clays from just hours before!

We’ve applied the expertise of our subcontractor to help mitigate delays on the Driver Training Facility to allow the project to complete in fall 2012. The Virginia State Police are eager to move into their new facility and, as with most projects, time is of the essence. Without thinking outside the box and challenging normal conventions, the winter earthwork production would have jeopardized our delivery schedule.

When Building Relationships, it’s critical we never stop looking for ways to deliver upon our promises and maximize value for our clients. Simply idling back the equipment and waiting for sunnier days was not an option!

Construction was ready to proceed until a final site utility survey brought one unexpected detail to our attention — a live underground power line lying within the new building layout. The discovery of a hot Dominion primary reducing the available casting area by 12 feet called for an immediate revision of the construction plan.

Before the power line was removed.

Once this issue was discovered, the KBS team quickly requested Dominion Power‘s onsite assistance to relocate the existing power line outside the building limits. However, moving the line would take a great deal of work and ultimately delay construction by at least six weeks. Further delaying the project was not an option.

To keep the project moving forward, a contingency plan was modeled to compress the casting operation and proceed with the work around the obstruction. The following Building Information Model (BIM) video illustrates the planned approach of casting the tilt-up concrete wall panels and the revision after the power line was identified (shown at the 33-second point of the video).

With a new panelization plan set in place, Dominion Power was accommodating to our needs by working with the KBS team to de-energize the existing power line and install a new power line through a conduit installed outside of the building pad.

After the power line was removed.

This unexpected condition created the potential for a major delay. However, the collaboration between KBS, Dominion Power and numerous subcontractors, the impact was mitigated with a creative problem-solving approach. Special thanks goes to Dominion Power for their hard work in accommodating our requests which allowed KBS to maintain the schedule and deliver a quality product to NAPA in a timely manner.

–Contributed by Warren Rutledge, KBS project engineer

By Jim Benn, Senior Project Manager for KBS.

(Adapted from an article written for the March 2011 edition of Commonwealth Contractor, a magazine printed by the Associated Builders and Contractors-Virginia Chapter)

Building 160 at the Yards circa 2008

In October 2008, Building 160 (also known as The Foundry Lofts) was caught square in the crosshairs of Black Week when the Dow Jones industrial average fell a record 1,874 points and 18 percent and closed low for all five sessions; in addition, the S&P 500 fell more than 20 percent. Building 160 at the Yards is part of a Forest City Washington development project. A 1920s era structure formerly part of the Washington Navy Yards, the project was set to be renovated in the first phase of Forest City’s development known as The Yards—a 45-acre mixed-use development in Southeast D.C. near the new Nationals ballpark.

By September, KBS had completed 17 percent of the $33.8 million dollar adaptive reuse contract. It was around this time that it became evident to Forest City’s financial experts that a conventional lending arrangement was becoming problematic as deal after deal fell through with the collapse of banks including Lehman Brothers and Goldman Saks. What would normally have been a sweetheart deal for any bank—an owner willing to invest $15 million of its own capital in a $55 million project—was nearly unattainable.

Building 160 Suspended

By late September the decision was made to suspend Building 160 hopefully for one month, three at the most; and on October 13, 2008, KBS received a phased suspension letter.

A snapshot was taken of existing project funds and then KBS and Forest City worked closely to identify which trades to shut down completely and selectively, determining the financial implications for each scenario. After studies were completed for each trade a comprehensive plan was approved and implemented.

For example, the window package for the project, the single largest subcontract representing almost one tenth of the project budget was days away from going into production; so suspending production of the windows was an easy decision to make. On the other hand, a tower crane was erected to install the additional two stories on the roof of the four-story existing structure and the steel and prefabricated framing systems were already fabricated. A cost analysis indicated that it would be less expensive to continue this phase of the project than to shut it down.

Subcontractor’s and vendors were individually called and informed in writing of the situation and asked to provide an accurate Application for Payment, specifically documenting the value of any stored materials. A detailed video was taken of each area of the project including containers rented for valuable materials; and the detailed inventory was reviewed by Forest City and KBS for proper documentation.

By December 2008, all phased suspension was complete, temporary protection installed and the project officially mothballed.

Building 160 Restarted

Forest City explored numerous financing options in order to restart the project as quickly as the successful completion of that task would allow. They settled on a financing package obtained through the D.C. Housing and Finance Authority, under a risk-sharing program established with the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and funded by a total of $47.7 million of New Issue Bond Program (NIBP) bonds.

One year after the notification of a phased suspension, KBS was informed that the job was restarting and that they should prepare a detailed estimate for the cost-to-complete agreement. Given the time that had elapsed and changing market conditions, KBS had to rebid all but the few selected trades that had completed shop drawings and submittals.

In spite of a few delays in closing, KBS remobilized to the site in September 2010; it is projected to complete and turn over the first four floors in October 2011, with the remaining two story “signature” units on the fifth floor completed by December 2011.

Collaboration Wins

Through the dedicated collaborative efforts of the entire project team, what was initially an unfortunate result of the decline of the nation’s banking and finance industry, a timely restart to a keystone project in Forest City’s development of The Yards project was accomplished.

From initial award of the project through suspension and restart, the common goals of the entire project team, from the subcontractors and vendors to the architect, KBS and most importantly, Forest City Washington, were met through a combination of trust, open communication and collaboration. An unfortunate turn of events in the financial industry and the country as a whole, through hard work and a team oriented approach, was turned around 180 degrees to produce a final product that will anchor an exciting mixed-use development in the shadows of our Nation’s Capitol.

Side Bar: The NIBP program that was implemented as part of the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 is designed to help provide market liquidity for bonds that housing finance agencies use to provide financing.

Demonstration of a hand-held scanner which reads carpet content and determines recyclability.

KBS staff learns about construction recycling tools.

When KBS was just entering into LEED and the green building market, I was assigned to the CarMax Corporate Headquarters project to help with the documentation necessary for LEED certification. At that time, the Richmond marketplace was unaccustomed to the demands placed upon it for LEED-friendly waste disposal. The method we ended up using on the project was having individual dumpsters labeled with signs for concrete, wood, metal, etc., tracking endless amounts of dumpster tickets, lots of photos, and trusting that everyone was putting the trash in the appropriate receptacles. I spent many hours tracking all of the waste using tickets and spreadsheets and wishing for the day when it would be just a bit easier to document waste management.

The days of separate dumpsters are in the past. Ace can provide dumpsters, trailers, and you can even take your own loads of waste to Ace — and even if they are commingled they are able to separate the different types of waste into appropriate groups for recycling. Ace has the capability to recycle all sorts of materials that we couldn’t recycle on the CarMax project, including drywall and plastics. Ace can also provide recycling for demolition materials such as furniture, tile, carpet and brick.

One of the things that I found most interesting is that Ace Recycling also sells some of the recycled materials to customers, right down to used plastic buckets. Crushed stone, fill dirt and wood chips are just a few of the many products that Ace has for purchase.

Ace Recycling's facility features recycled construction materials.

Not only does Ace Recycling do a great job in waste management, they also support the entire idea of “green” by their actual facility itself. Their 70,000-square-foot facility was a former tobacco processing plant. Just walking into their building, you see reused materials all around you — the reception desk, the furniture, the carpet, and bathroom partitions to name a few things. Rain collected from their rooftop is used for dust control in the plant area. Daylighting is used to reduce the need for traditional lights. Even the parking lot contains aggregate that Ace Recycling produced.

Ace Recycling offers facility tours for large and small groups — and if you want to see them in action, Baskervill and Ace Recycling are joining forces to kick off Earth Month 2011 with a residential construction debris collection day on April 1 — dropoffs can be made between the hours of 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. that day in the alley behind Canal Crossing. Anyone interested can contact Baskervill at 804-343-1010 for more details.

Many thanks to Ace Recycling for providing KBS employees the opportunity to tour their facility as part of the ongoing KBS Institute learning series.

Contributed by: Liz Blanks, LEED AP, LEED Coordinator