Down in the trench
Forced into action by insatiable curiosity, we go into the Trench to check the progress of Reno’s one and only Project ReTRAC
Shotcrete nozzleman Daniel Carey sprays a wet form of concrete, which, along with soil nails (basically steel pounded into the soil and pressure-grouted in) and some retaining walls, stabilizes the soil on the outer trench walls. The shotcrete averages 4-6 inches in depth.
Photo By David Robert
Admit it. You’ve been curious. Every time you drive over the Keystone Avenue bridge or cross one of the main north-south thoroughfares downtown, you’ve wondered just how that trench is progressing.
The plan to drop the train tracks through Reno’s downtown into a 33-feet-deep trench was … controversial. But as the politics dropped to a low hum after the Aug. 22, 2002, contract award to Granite Construction; since then the buzz has changed to questions about traffic, timetables and engineering.
“So what’s going on beyond those high plywood walls?” you’ve wondered, as you passed in fits and starts under the Reno arch. The fences on the bridges were installed to foil rubberneckers like yourself and to keep the traffic flowing (when there isn’t a train stopped on the tracks), but couldn’t they at least put some windows in the danged things?
We’ve seen the trucks, dodged the roadblocks and peeked around the barriers, too. But our curiosity finally got the better of us, so we placed a call to Dante Pistone, external affairs manager for Granite Construction and the ReTRAC project.
Pistone was no slouch, and the ball was suddenly rolling like a runaway freight. Would the recent snowstorm derail a tour of the 2.25-mile project? Could it be too muddy for the front-end loaders, dump trucks and concrete pourers? Would the five days of fog make it impossible for a photographic exposition of the trench project thus far?
With Al Lord, Granite’s structural supervisor in charge of concrete, playing the role of Casey Jones, we plowed into the unknown.
“We’re about 80-85 percent done with the excavation,” Lord says. Assuming that’s true, then Granite has already removed some 480,000 cubic feet of soil.
ReTRAC is starting to take shape, and the difference between seeing a 33-feet-deep, 54-feet-wide trench on paper or walking on the poured concrete is like the difference between seeing a unsuspecting guy hit with a football on America’s Funniest Home Videos and actually being the guy. It’s incredible, and basically, useful adjectives fail there.
Sure, it looks like a pile of mud and snow, but this pile of mud and snow has significance: It is the extreme western end of the trench. The trench’s two train tracks, which will allow for two-way train traffic, will tie into the existing tracks near the signal in the upper left corner of the photograph. In the top-right corner, Fourth Street’s Mi Casa Too restaurant.
Photo By David Robert
Just on the west side of Keystone Avenue, looking toward downtown. On the right side of the image (south side of the trench), a road will run along the tracks for emergency vehicles and maintenance. In the foreground, workers tie rebar. It will eventually form the reinforcement for a vertical wall, which, along with the matching wall outside the emergency-access road, will keep out potential floodwaters and other undesirable elements. The walls are being constructed strong enough to place concrete “caps,” or even buildings, over parts of the trench, although that is not part of the existing plan.
Photo By David Robert
These three tubes will replace a 96-inch storm drain that runs north and south on the west side of Vine Street, directly behind ReTRAC headquarters. They will run under the train tracks, which ride on top of a smooth concrete layer, called the “invert slab,” which in turn rests atop a layer of concrete called the “seal slab.” One of the purposes of the seal slab is to provide weight to prevent a rising water table (if there is a flood, for example) from lifting and cracking the floor of the trench. The 66-inch diameter concrete tubes will siphon water back to street level without the benefit of mechanical pumps. Some 640,000 square feet of concrete will be poured for Project ReTRAC, some of which will be 8 feet thick.
Photo By David Robert
This green, 18-inch tubing, which will be encased in the “invert” layer of concrete and will increase in circumference to 36 inches as it gets to the lowest point of the trench, will move rainwater to a pump station near the existing Amtrak station where an oil-water separator will clean the water and then send it into the Truckee River.
Photo By David Robert
This shot west of the Arlington bridge illustrates how close the trench is being dug to existing buildings and structures. The bridges were undermined and reinforced from beneath so that commuters would be less impacted by the trench construction. Eight of the 11 bridges that will span the trench are already completed.
Photo By David Robert
These workers are balanced approximately 14 feet in the air, working on the walls of what will be the pump station, which will contain two oil-water separators. Water flow from outside the trench will run through storm drains that will run parallel to the trench.
Photo By David Robert
Superintendent Allen Stanton conducts a test to determine the strength of soil nails. The gauge measures in kips (1,000-pound increments) and tests to 120 percent of the designed load. If the nail moves .040 of an inch in 10 minutes at 58,200 psi, it is removed and replaced. The stickers on Stanton’s hardhat indicate his union affiliation. The trench is a union job.
Photo By David Robert
In a manner that hearkens back to pre-Information Age silver mining, existing historic buildings had to be retrofitted with stabilizing footings. Under the Fitzgerald’s Casino parking garage on North Virginia Street, shown here, workers hand-dug down as much as 26-and-a-half feet, made forms and poured concrete to support the buildings that border the trench. Eventually, buildings like the Amtrak station, the Freight House, the Men’s Club and the Fitzgerald’s parking garage will sit on solid foundations of reinforced concrete.
Photo By David Robert
The Amtrak station will have a lower level for boarding the train, complete with an escalator and freight and human elevators. This photo shows the pit for the freight elevator.
Photo By David Robert
Including subcontractors, Project ReTRAC employs some 200 workers. All visitors to the trench are supposed to wear their hardhats at all times.
Photo By David Robert
At the eastern end of the trench, steel forms for the trench’s concrete walls run toward the Wells Overpass where the trench returns to grade (street level). The main construction of the $264-million trench is expected to be completed in November. All told, some 600,000 cubic yards of dirt and fill will have been removed before it’s finished.
Photo By David Robert
Our guide, Al Lord, Granite’s structural supervisor in charge of concrete, acted as Granite Construction’s public relations person until it was time to start getting his boots muddy. “The project will be completed,” he said, “on time and under budget.” So far, so good. While the big snowfall may have delayed things by five days, in general, everything is going according to plan.
Photo By David Robert
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