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Envrionment
The Everglades Restoration: What's Going On?
Florida has begun a massive restoration program to preserve the Everglades, the River of Grass.
(southeast.construction.com, April 2006 issue)
By Debra
Wood
After a slow start, some Florida-funded
projects on the $7.8 billion Comprehensive Everglades Restoration
Program have begun. The work aims to restore a more natural
water flow through the River of Grass.
"We've seen significant changes
to the detriment of the natural existing environment in South
Florida as a result of water-control features built during
the past 60 years," said Dennis Duke, U.S. Army Corps
of Engineers program manger for South Florida Restoration.
Secondly, South Florida is experiencing a water shortage.
"We're wasting 1.7 billion gallons a day, on average,
to the ocean. That used to flow through the Everglades. We
want to capture that water and retain it for the natural and
human environment."
Congress approved the Comprehensive
Everglades Restoration Program, or CERP, as part of the Water
Resources Development Act of 2000, which was signed into law
by President Bill Clinton. The Corps of Engineers and the
South Florida Water Management District share responsibility
for reviving habitat for endangered and threatened animals
and for providing water and flood control to the area.
New reservoirs will capture water now
discharged through the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers.
That stored water can be used to supplement drinking water
supplies.
"We're trying to mimic in an engineered
system what Mother Nature used to do naturally," said
Jeff Kivett, project director for SFWMD consultant Jacobs
Montgomery Joint Venture, a partnership between Jacobs Engineering
Group of Pasadena, Calif., and MWH of Broomfield, Colo.
CERP cannot simply turn the Everglades
back to what it was historically because that would result
in flooding of homes or agricultural land. Hence, engineers
designed systems to replicate water flow while preventing
adverse effects.
But the massive CERP has been slow to
get off the ground, and the $175 million in planning, modeling
and review work the Corps has done has been behind the scenes.
Duke the original schedule called for
Congress to pass subsequent water resources acts every two
years, but federal priorities have since changed.
"We should have had certain projects
under construction by this point, but until Congress authorizes
the projects and provides the construction funds, we cannot
do that," he added.
The Corps now projects construction
costs will increase to $10.5 billion, with 60 percent of that
due to inflation.
Meanwhile, the State of Florida established
its own Acceler8 Program in 2004 to speed up design and construction
of its projects. Bond financing will fund $1.5 billion in
design and construction work on eight key projects, expected
to wrap up in 2010, rather than the initially projected 2020.
"They tried to pick projects that
would give the largest lift to the environment," Kivett
said. "Most of the projects in the Acceler8 program are
independent of each other. They're in distinct parts of the
different regions."
Reservoirs
Barnard Construction Co. of Bozeman,
Mont., constructed two aboveground test cells in 2005 for
the Everglades Agricultural Area Reservoir. It is building
two test cells at the C-43 Caloosahatchee River-West Storage
Reservoir and expects to receive the contract to start construction
this year on two test cells for the C-44 St. Lucie Canal Reservoir.
"They're using different embankment
designs conducive for the geology of that specific area, and
once they fill up, they'll look at seepage rates," said
Jeff Higgins, vice president of Barnard. "It's validating
the design engineers' assumptions and making sure they're
heading in the right direction."
The full, $275 million Everglades Agricultural
Area Reservoir, scheduled to start this year, remains in design,
pending evaluation of the test cell results. The reservoir
will capture freshwater releases from Lake Okeechobee and
runoff from agricultural areas into a 190,000-acre-ft. aboveground
reservoir. The project includes two pump stations. At the
end of January, SFWMD was reviewing bids for the construction-manager-at-risk
contract.
The $340 million, 10,800-acre C-43 Caloosahatchee
River West Storage Reservoir, scheduled to begin construction
in June 2007, will collect and store stormwater runoff and
water released from Lake Okeechobee in a 12- to 24-ft.-deep
reservoir that will protect salinity in the Caloosahatchee
Estuary and provide water to nearby farms and homes.
The project includes 15 million cu.
yds. of excavation, placing 710,000 cu. yds. of soil cement,
building a pump station with two pumps and constructing 12
weirs, gated box culverts and gated spillways.
C-44, the St. Lucie Canal Reservoir,
is estimated to cost $273 million and is scheduled to begin
construction in October. It will protect the St. Lucie Estuary
and Indian River Lagoon from stormwater runoff by collecting
and treating it in a 3,000-acre, 12- to 14-ft.-deep aboveground
reservoir that will hold 36,000 acre ft. to 42,000 acre ft.
of water.
C-44 includes 6,000 acres of 4-ft.-deep
Stormwater Treatment Areas with emergent vegetation, canals
and water-control structures. Crews will remove an existing
pump station and construct a new 1,100-cu.-ft.-per-second,
diesel/electrical pump station with three or four pumps and
expand an existing canal.
Other Acceler8 projects
The Everglades Agricultural Area Stormwater
Treatment Area Expansion will add 4,500 acres of marsh to
a 40,000-acre wetland already built by the state. Water from
agricultural areas flows through the marshes. The plant life
absorbs phosphorus from fertilizers and filters the water
before it reaches the Everglades.
Gulf Group of Panama City, Fla., has
begun working in Stormwater Treatment Area Expansion Compartment
B, Area 2, Cell 4. It features 10 mi. of levees, requiring
800,000 cu. yds. of fill; 11 mi. of canal, requiring 1 million
cu. yds. of excavation; construction of gated precast inflow
and outflow culverts; and conversion of a seepage pump station
to a gated structure.
Stormwater Treatment Area Expansion
Compartment C will begin in July and cost $78 million. Harry
Pepper & Associates of Jacksonville received the contract
for Area 6, Section 2, which includes 6.9 mi. of perimeter
levees and 6.9 mi. of borrow canals, 4.5 mi. of backfill farm
canals, 10 gated control structures, 6.75 mi. of power line
extensions and two access bridges.
In compartment C, Area 5, Flow-way 3,
crews from Interlaken of Manalapan, Fla., will build 10 mi.
of perimeter and internal levees, six control gated structures,
5.5 mi. of power line extensions and recreational facilities.
Harry Pepper has begun work on phase
1, the Prairie canal on the Picayune Strand (Southern Golden
Gate Estates) Restoration to create a natural flow of water
to Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge, provide
flood protection and improve water quality. Crews will remove
227 mi. of road and build three diesel-powered pump stations
sized for a 100-year storm event. They also will build spreader
canals, canal plugs and levee protection. Phase two of the
$125 million project will begin in August.
"It's going to create habitat for
the Florida panthers and various other endangered species,"
Kivett said.
Five Water Preserve Areas will buffer
natural and developed areas and divert runoff into storage
areas. The $16 million 3A/3B levee seepage management area
will begin construction in July. The work includes ecosystem
restoration, wetlands enhancement, modification of existing
canals, raising a maintenance access road by 1 ft. and adding
bridges to access an electric company substation and a mobile
home community.
The district expects construction to
begin on the $15 million ACME Basin B this spring and finish
by year-end. The project includes 1 million cu. yds. of cut
and 512,433 cu. yds. of fill, construction of a 4-ft. levee,
seepage canals, two pump stations and four culverts.
Site 1 Impoundment, a $47 million project
set to begin in October, features a seepage management system,
pump station, three gated culverts and canal and levee improvements.
The $69 million C-11 impoundment involves
1,850 acres, a three-bay ogee-gated spillway, pump station,
gated and ungated culverts, two fixed weir structures and
seepage canals, embankments and windbreaks. Work will begin
in August and includes 1 million cu. yards of excavation and
placement of 750,000 cu. yds. of material for levees.
C-9 Impoundment, a $47 million project
to store 6,600 acre ft. of water, will begin in July and includes
construction of spillways, culverts, weirs and canals.
The $14 million Biscayne Bay Coastal
Wetlands project will restore water quality and distribution
of fresh water into the bay, increase coastal wetlands and
enhance marine habitat. That work will begin in August 2007.
The $40 million C-111 Spreader Canal,
set to begin construction in November 2007, will eliminate
harmful freshwater discharges into Florida Bay and revitalize
wetlands in the Southern Glades and Model Lands.
SFWMD is dividing the projects into
multiple contracts and will award them to prequalified contactors.
Most major projects remain up for grabs, with prequalification
continuing throughout the process.
"A significant amount of bidding
will come out the end of this year through next year,"
Kivett said. "The district is really interested in small
business development and local communities, so we will strategically
and economically break these into packages."
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