Sarcee Trail
The foundation of an existing residential apartment building in Southwest Calgary was compromised and required remedial measures to be completed.
RWH designed a micropile underpinning system based on the initial geotechnical investigation. Together, HCM and RWH developed a testing strategy to confirm the soil bond strength and the design parameters obtained from the report. This involved installing and loading a sacrificial micropile to 250% of the design load. The test was successful and the remaining production micropiles were installed as designed.
The challenging aspect of this project was working within the confined space beneath the building. Initially having only a 1.2m headroom restriction, the installation areas were excavated to 2.3m below the bottom floor in a series of trenches and ventilation openings were constructed. A low headroom? TEI rock drill was brought into the confined space in pieces and reassembled at the drilling locations. Furthermore, the compressor for the drill had to be located outside the building.
These challenges were met with efficient and safe solutions by HCM.
Client: Madden Matthews Eng. Ltd.
Location: Calgary, Alberta
