Fernley Canal Mystery
No one in Fernley, Nevada is yet sure about what caused a breach in the canal's earthen wall. The flood caused significant damage to the town. The US Bureau of Reclamation (BuRec) has indicated a cause may not be discovered; but that what is for sure is that the canal will be repaired with stronger materials and a more modern design. The precise design has not been selected yet.
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A Failure to Communicate
In Palmyra, Maine the city has asked contractors to rebid a road reconstruction process. Three miles of roads are to be rebuilt on geosynthetics and gravel, but the bids the contractors submitted showed significant confusion as to who would provide the gravel and what sort of geotextile would be needed. Geosynthetics are designed for specific functions and situations. The city has wisely put the contractors on the same page.
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India and INDA
The government of India and INDA, a nonwovens industry association, are teaming up to organize nonwovens and geotextile workshops. The aim is to improve the technical textile knowledge base in the country.
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Specifying Geotextiles
geosindex.com lists geosynthetic data and it's free to access. Registration is never requested. For a sample of what the site provides, check out the geotextile data. The interactive table is sortable and users can choose what criteria fields they would like to see, such as CBR Puncture, NTPEP, and tensile strength. Questions on how to use the site or how to list your products? Contact us.
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Owens Corning S&A News
Per European regulatory remedies required to finalize Owens Corning's acquisition of Saint-Gobain's reinforcements and composite fabrics businesses, the company has agreed to sell composites plants in Belgium and Norway.
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Hidden Costs
Evaluating soils is a tricky business, as Winston-Salem officials have found out. An additional $830,000 was added to the end of a road-widening project, largely due to the need for unplanned drainage and erosion control operations. The upfront soil analysis missed the trouble zones, and the city's lack of month-to-month project oversight led to the surprise bill. North Carolina recently toughened its EC rules.
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Park Place
Will Delury Square in Manhattan get a new park? Only if a landownership group gets a couple assurances: one, teenagers will be discouraged from congregating; two, a sinkhole will be fixed. While officials say they can do little about the teenagers (who apparently use a nearby Burger King), they are planning to correct settling soil with geotextiles.
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Coulby Pond's Future
Coulby Pond in Wickliffe, Ohio is getting so full of sediment that the aquatic life is declining. City officials are to debate tonight, Monday, whether to move forth with dredging. But dredging operations may not be enough. Bank reinforcement may be needed, and a liner may need to be installed to prevent further erosion.
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Deterring Pavement Failure
The Appleton Post-Gazette has published an article on the role of geogrids in improving roads in Menasha, Wisconsin. After more than 20 years of failures, officials finally specified geogrid reinforcement for the 2-mile rebuild. Poor soil conditions along the road shoulders are thought to be a contributor to the years of poor road performance.
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Workshop Review
The IGS India promoted workshop: Applications of Geosynthetics - Present and Future” was held 20-21 September 2007 in Gandhinagar (Gujarat), India. Read a review sent by A.C. Gupta, Treasurer, Indian Chapter of IGS.
Class Cancellation
Regarding the NAGS sponsored FHWA National Highway Institute Newly Revised Geosynthetics Course: The reinforcement class is scheduled for November 1-2 as planned. There is still room for participants - please ignore the registration deadline date on the brochure, but submit it ASAP if you are planning to attend. The roadways class scheduled for Oct 31 - Nov 1 has been cancelled.
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TRM Needed
The Winchester Star in Virginia has published a list of 30 requirements needing to be met at a new high school site. Among the list, provided by View Engineering, is to correct the plan's specification of a woven geotextile where View believes a TRM is more appropriate. A number of TRMs and their data can be seen at geosindex.com.
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Hanging Lake Tunnel
The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) is finishing repair work on a large panel crack that formed in the tunnel roof at Hanging Lake. Part of the repair involved installing geofoam blocks and geosynthetic reinforcement--though the author of the article did not seem to understand geosynthetics if we're to judge by the description of the installation.
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Too Much Parking
Aerial surveys are revealing some troubling aspects about parking lots. Conventional pavements are known to be fantastic carriers of pollutants. The number of parking lots being constructed raises alarm. Solutions? More porous pavement installations, turf reinforcement mats vegetated with metal-consuming remediation plants, better inlet protection, etc.
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NJ Wants Living Shorelines
The state of New Jersey wants to armor its shorelines...but softly. The old hard armor embankments, so common in the state, are no longer desired by state agencies. Instead, they would like to see softer solutions. This might include geotextile tubes, vegetated turf reinforcement mats (TRMs), and much more.
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SDSU's Erosion Control Lab
The Bend Weekly News contains an article on the erosion control testing lab at San Diego State University (SDSU). Rain machines and tilted tables, coir logs and turf reinforcement mats (TRMs); the list of clients, both public and private, is long. The writer seems to have enjoyed his introduction to the subject, and he's done a decent job capturing the basics of what different erosion control materials aim to do.
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Underwriters Featured
The forthcoming issue of Land & Water will feature a generic article on canal lining geosynthetics. The article, "Smarter Infrastructures" by Chris Kelsey, offers a general introduction to types of liner materials.
Construction Specifications
Need construction specifications that include geosynthetics? Many manufacturers offer documents at their websites. For example, visit Propex. Under "Landfill/Waste Containment," one finds documents regarding lagoon closure, lining system support, leachate collection, and more (found at the "continued" link below). Other manufacturers may be found at this link https://www.geosynthetica.net/ProductsServices.asp
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Then and Now
American Chronicle has published an article on textile history. The short but wide-ranging piece touches upon terminology, antiquity, applications, and plant, animal and mineral textiles. It also includes a couple nods to geotextiles for industrial applications and embankment reinforcement.
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Stabilizing Huff's Levee
Today Yolo County, California is awarding roughly $3 million in contracts to stabilize the eroded levee at Huff's Corner. One of the key elements in the approved design's repair will be geogrid reinforcement layers spaced every two feet. Along two sections of a quarter-mile stretch, 25 percent of the levee washed away in a New Year's 2006 storm.
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First Geogrids in Arran
Soft peat beneath roads has caused subsidence concerns on the Scottish isle of Arran. Geogrid reinforcement is being installed, though. It is the first time the material has been utilized there for road improvement, so crews have gone slowly. While the delay has frustrated business owners, the long-range road plan and design was badly needed.
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Geogrids in the News
In Cumming, Georgia, the construction of a 24,000 square-foot retail center required plenty of drainage support and land management. An 850-foot-long, 20-foot-high block wall was constructed along a cut for the back of the site. Geogrid reinforcement was installed.
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Protecting Cancun
Roughly 1200 meters of geotextile tubes will be installed along Cancun beaches as part of an erosion control protection scheme. Cancun lost much of its beach sand after Hurricane Wilma (October 2005). Restoring sand cost $20 million. The tube reinforcement design will cost roughly $1 million. Cancun is also the site of the 1st Pan American conference, GeoAmericas 2008.
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Synthetics and Biodegradables
The mix of erosion control materials available on the market is great. Depending on the needed functional longevity, grade, water velocity and cost, project teams may prefer to mix short-term and permanent devices, reports Tara Beechem in Erosion Control. Colbond's Enkamat turf reinforcement mats is one of the materials noted in the article. Read it online.
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Blanket Statements
Roberta Baxter explores several projects that have employed erosion control products in a variety of settings and conditions. Read the Erosion Control magazine article that highlights the products of the following geosynthetica.net Underwriters: North American Green, Colbond, East Coast Erosion Blankets and Propex.
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