Silver Line Dulles WMATA Metrorail progress/pictures

strench707 wrote:Hey guys my dad was driving through the general Tysons area for a dinner and he grabbed two pics on his cellphone (low quality cam) of the construction. He's not over there much so he couldn't give me exact locations but if any of you guys know feel free to chime in.

It looks like heading northbound on 123 where it goes under the beltway. The piers are for Metro, the new bridge that is under construction is part of the HOT-lane project.

"strench707"
Okay, so why was the original one built in an oval shape? Did they anticipate a different support method or do you think it was just to be able to accommodate a wide range of supports when it was actually time to build?

The stub is oval for collision protection. It is typical to make the lower portion of bridge bents adjacent to railroad tracks beefier to protect the structural bearing portion of the bridge bent from collision damage.

I will post an example of a beefier bridge bent adjacent to railroad track tomorrow.


MD US-13 Salisbury Bypass over Norfolk Southern Delmarva Secondary and northbound Business MD US-13 South Fruitland Boulevard.

"strench707"
Hey guys my dad was driving through the general Tysons area for a dinner and he grabbed two pics on his cellphone (low quality cam) of the construction. He's not over there much so he couldn't give me exact locations but if any of you guys know feel free to chime in.

These were taken today:


Columns on the right side of VA I-495 Capitol Beltway future outer loop of roadway.


Different angle of the above.


Columns in northwest corner of VA I-495 Capitol Beltway VA-123 Dolly Madison Boulevard interchange, the bridge above is Westpark Drive.


Different angle of the above.

Both of my pictures were taken from the top of Parking Terrace E in Tysons Corner Center.

The rest of the picture can be seen at Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project Construction Photos 05-07-2010 Some of the picture appear in posts made near the beginning of May.

Okay cool thanks guys, great shots SBJ!

Also I wonder if they will put some kind of plastic or metal sheeting to cover the change in support size so it looks more like a smooth and not an abrupt edge between the two. More of an aesthetic thing but if there's money it might be done. Maybe like skirting around the top part with the bottom of the skirt fitted around the stub.

Davis

"strench707"
Okay cool thanks guys, great shots SBJ!

Also I wonder if they will put some kind of plastic or metal sheeting to cover the change in support size so it looks more like a smooth and not an abrupt edge between the two. More of an aesthetic thing but if there's money it might be done. Maybe like skirting around the top part with the bottom of the skirt fitted around the stub.

Don't expect any cosmetic embellishments. What you see in my after pictures is what you get.

Okay lol, I was just throwing that out there,

Davis

A little blurb from the paper the other day:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 06196.html

Aging pier footings pass safety tests for Dulles Metrorail Project

Safety tests on aging foundations that will be used to support a bridge carrying Metrorail trains over Interstate 66 have verified that the footings are structurally sound, officials with the Dulles Metrorail Project said Thursday.

"JackRussell"
A little blurb from the paper the other day:

Aging pier footings pass safety tests for Dulles Metrorail Project

This is an I told you so moment for me. When this article was published, Safety issue raised in Dulles rail bridge project on 11 22 2009 this is what I posted at subchat.com:


Tracy A Woodward The Washington Post

"There are number of reasons why I am making this post:

I have made it know for many years in this forum and others of the existence of the provision built in the K Route Orange line easement to accommodate the construction of the future Tyson, Dulles, Loudoun County N Route Silver line.

I don't see this being all that big of an issue. These footing, when originally built, were designed to WMATA's established loading standards. They have sat unused for more then 30 years. During those 30 years they have not been subjected to the pounding of weight from passing trains. WMATA has hundreds of similar pier footings throughout the system that are older that have never failed. Those older footing have been carrying the load of trains a hell of a lot longer then these that have not.

I am not buying the electrolysis induced corrosion argument. The folks that designed and built the system were very meticulous about bonding and ground their structures to minimize electrolysis induced corrosion. VDOT, MDSHA and DCDPW have numinous bridge foundation structures adjacent to WMATA's tracks that have not suffered from electrolysis induced corrosion.

The article mention that WMATA could not locate any of the records or documents on the foundation footing. Did they think to check VDOT plan and record archive? The article mentions that it was a contractor working for VDOT that did the construction of the column foundation footings.

I have been aware of the column stub between tracks K3 and K1 as seen in the photos above sense before the K Route Orange line opened to Vienna in on 06 07 1086.

What I didn't know is there were 12 other foundation footing constructed at the same time column stub was built.

The alignment shown in the FEIS did not utilize any of the column foundation footings. There is no mention FEIS for the reason why the column foundation footings were not to be utilized."

Wait where were all of these other footings? I am assuming that the one always pictured is the only one that was built with a column stub during Orange Line Construction. Also, why was that the only one used?

And the big kicker, why was this ever a press-worthy issue? I don't recall the WMATA going out and making a big deal out of whether or not those pieces of the infrastructure were structurally sound or not.

Davis

"strench707"
Wait where were all of these other footings?

See Washington Post A question of safety graphc.

I am assuming that the one always pictured is the only one that was built with a column stub during Orange Line Construction. Also, why was that the only one used?

All 11 of them will be used. The only one that we could see (pier 4) was the stub between tracks K1 and K3. The other 10 were exposed and tested. The contractor is still preparing the piling caps for columns on 9 of them. Pier 9 had rebar cage on it when I took this picture on 06 23 2010:


And the big kicker, why was this ever a press-worthy issue? I don't recall the WMATA going out and making a big deal out of whether or not those pieces of the infrastructure were structurally sound or not.

This issues was not of WMATA's making. A former employee of Dulles Transit Partners got a curly hair up his ass and forwarded his concerns to the FTA, see the Washing Post article Safety issue raised in Dulles rail bridge project. Dulles Transit Partners agreed to more extensively test all of the piles, see the Washing Post article Extensive testing in new safety plan for Metro bridge. After all was said and done the piles met the loading requirements and showed no signs of electrolysis induced corrosion. The Post then published the article you provided the link to Aging pier footings pass safety tests for Dulles Metrorail Project.

Wow that person must've left on poor terms, I mean who (outside of the project staff) would care so much about these footings? And why wouldn't he contact the project staff rather than get some agency involved? Maybe it made him feel empowered to have caused an entire investigation.

Some people...

Davis

"strench707"
Wow that person must've left on poor terms, I mean who (outside of the project staff) would care so much about these footings? And why wouldn't he contact the project staff rather than get some agency involved? Maybe it made him feel empowered to have caused an entire investigation.

The person in question was "Steve T. Mackey, chief bridge manager for the Silver Line extension" until late 2008. Mackey was part of that staff. His concern were overruled by others on that staff so took them to the FTA.

Wow talk about stubborn,

Davis

"strench707"
Wow talk about stubborn,

More like CYA. I have no idea what Mr.Mackey's background is. He may be unfamiliar with the fact that during the time of the construction of those pilings one of the partners that makes up Dulles Transit Partners (Bechtel Corporation) had a contractual relationship with WMATA. Bechtel Corporation then Bechtel Associates was doing quality control and inspections of the work being done by the dozens contractors building the system for WMATA from ground breaking to sometime in 1980s.

I went out to see how things were going yesterday, and took a few photos. Let's start along I-66 (click to enlarge):



You see pier construction going along nicely next to the existing tracks. You also can see a pair of steel beams atop the piers in the background - this is yet a different construction method that they are using in here. My wife was asking why they are switching from steel beams and concrete beams, and I didn't know the answer. Anyone have any thoughts.

There was one other odd thing that I can't figure out here:



There is a pier that seems completely out of place, and I circled it here so you can see what I am talking about. Not only in a position that makes no sense, but the head is oriented in a way that doesn't make any sense to me.

Going a little further up the road, they are continuing on with the concrete beams - there is still one more to go before it connects to where they are using the steel beams. I am kind of torn on how to get good photos of these things - I can't get back far enough to get it all in the frame, so here I am experimenting with some photo-stitching software that can take a series of photos and glue them together into a wide one. There is clearly some distortion, but you can get the sense of what is going on. I had thought I had one more photo on the RHS, but this is all I ended up with. If people don't like the stitched photos, I can go back to doing it the old way.



Further up the road the aerial construction using the truss is moving along. They have completed two sections, and half of a third is now done.



Finally up along Rt 123, I took a photo of the pier construction:



The truss is not yet visible in the distant background - it will be a number of weeks before it is far enough along. You can see that most of the piers in this area are now complete or nearly complete.

I checked out the cut-and-cover tunnel, and saw little progress. I can't help but wonder if they won't really cover these tunnels until the mining operations break through (which I am kind of guess will happen late in the fall of this year).

"JackRussell"
You see pier construction going along nicely next to the existing tracks. You also can see a pair of steel beams atop the piers in the background - this is yet a different construction method that they are using in here. My wife was asking why they are switching from steel beams and concrete beams, and I didn't know the answer. Anyone have any thoughts.

Different span length.

There was one other odd thing that I can't figure out here:

There is a pier that seems completely out of place, and I circled it here so you can see what I am talking about. Not only in a position that makes no sense, but the head is oriented in a way that doesn't make any sense to me.



A beam will span from circled column to column on left side of image with the form still wrapped around it. The beam will straddle the lanes of westbound VA I-66 between those two columns. The guideway beam will sit on top of the straddling beam.

See Washington Post A question of safety graphic.

That beam on those two columns will do the same thing these two beam are for that straddle the Access Road south of the VA-267 Dulles Connector Road VA-123 Dolly Madison Boulevard interchange.


Straddling beams forms over Dulles Access Road south of VA-267 Dulles Connector Road VA-123 Dolly Madison Boulevard interchange.


Straddling beams forms over Dulles Access Road south of VA-267 Dulles Connector Road VA-123 Dolly Madison Boulevard interchange.


Columns for straddling beam over Dulles Connector Road VA-123 in VA-267 Dulles Connector Road VA-123 Dolly Madison Boulevard interchange.

Going a little further up the road, they are continuing on with the concrete beams - there is still one more to go before it connects to where they are using the steel beams. I am kind of torn on how to get good photos of these things - I can't get back far enough to get it all in the frame, so here I am experimenting with some photo-stitching software that can take a series of photos and glue them together into a wide one. There is clearly some distortion, but you can get the sense of what is going on. I had thought I had one more photo on the RHS, but this is all I ended up with. If people don't like the stitched photos, I can go back to doing it the old way.

Don't try. Instead of trying profile shots shoot 3/4 shots.

I checked out the cut-and-cover tunnel, and saw little progress. I can't help but wonder if they won't really cover these tunnels until the mining operations break through (which I am kind of guess will happen late in the fall of this year).

Did you go behind the jersey wall and peek into the trench? I would hazard a guess the outbound box is done. There were only 2 more pours to do when I took pictures of it 06 23 2010. They had not poured any of the wall and tunnel roof in the inbound trench as of that date. The end of the trench where the bored tunnels end is where an emergency exit fan shaft will be located. The trench need not be open when the mining breaks through as they will be breaking through where the box tunnel begins.