When Mark Callahan looks back on the arduous but successful seven-year effort of managing the project development and environment study for the $1.6-billion Wekiva Parkway, he gives credit to an unlikely group—environmentalists who once opposed it.
“没有船上的环境团体，就不会发生。”卡拉汉（Callahan）领导了CH2M在佛罗里达州运输部（FDOT）的PD＆E学习工作以及当时的奥兰多 - 橙色县高速公路管理局（OOCEA）的工作。新利luckPD＆E研究于2005年开始，几乎是在区域环城公路的概念计划之后的20年，在2012年赢得联邦批准的关键。新利luck
The cooperative approach has implications for future infrastructure investments around the country.
环境alists weren’t just on board. At times, they took the wheel to help drive the long-stalled project forward by “drawing our alignments and giving us input,” recalls Callahan. If groups like the Florida Audubon Society hadn’t championed the project as ardently as they did, Callahan says, “We’d still be arm wrestling about the darned thing.”
取而代之的是，该项目最终通过Wekiva Parkway and Protection Act授权，该法案由当时的Gov签署为法律。Jeb Bush（R）于2004年。FDOT和Central Florida Expressway Authority（CFX）（持续的Oocea）共同管理这项16亿美元的项目。CFX处理了两个橙县的部分，FDOT监督位于湖和塞米诺尔县的部分。2013年，FDOT授予了De Moya集团在一月份完成的第4A和4B节的2720万美元设计建设合同。FDOT正在为第6节购买估计的2.2亿美元设计建设合同，其中包括Wekiva River Bridge。出价将于明年到期。
CFX is managing construction of 9.6 miles of new expressway. Prince Contracting holds the $56.1-million, 2.1-mile-long Section 1A contract, scheduled for completion in 2017. Superior Construction is building nearly 4.4 miles of expressway via a $46.6-million Section 1B contract targeting an April 2017 completion, and a $38.6-million contract scheduled to wrap up by January 2018. Southland Construction is building the 1.5-mile-long Section 2B via its $79.6-million contract, and GLF Construction holds a $49.5-million contract for the 1.6-mile-long Section 2C. Both sections are slated to finish in January 2018.
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入门
The effort to build the Wekiva Parkway dates to a 1986 study that produced conceptual designs. The parkway’s alignment runs through a part of the state noted for its unusual-for-Florida geography of rolling hills that includes multiple state parks, a bear wilderness area and other federally protected natural resources, including the nationally designated Wekiva River.
携带SR 429的公园大道最初将有四个车道，并具有终极的六车道建筑。它将连接到SR 417，完成一条长期追求的区域环城公路。朵拉（Dora）并从塞米诺尔州立森林（Seminole State Forest）搬迁了一英里的县道46A。
2012年5月带来了两个大里程碑。FHWA发布了没有重大影响的发现，提出了对环境影响声明的需求。FDOT和OOCEA（现为CFX）最终确定了一项初步资金协议。FDOT和CFX的财务承诺分别为11亿美元和近5.27亿美元。CFX在2015年获得了1.94亿美元的TIFIA贷款。该项目包括5亿美元的非收费道路改善。
“A lot of things fell into place,” says Ananth Prasad, national transportation sector leader for HNTB and FDOT secretary at the time. “Wekiva happened because of the willingness of all parties to clean up old issues, and that required a lot of give and take.” HNTB is engineering sections 1 to 5, while Atkins is designing sections 6 to 8.
The Florida Audubon Society (FAS) initiated that give-and-take, says Charles Lee, director of advocacy for the group’s Central Florida office. When FDOT officials and environmental groups had reached an impasse over the proposed beltway, FDOT instead started rolling out plans for widening Lake County’s State Road 46 that Audubon’s Lee calls “just awful.” The proposed expansion “would spur all kinds of development … and would have increased wildlife mortality,” Lee says, especially of black bears. “It became clear to us that just saying ‘No’ didn’t get us anywhere but to a totally unacceptably expanded SR 46.”
Consequently, Lee and Callahan recall, FAS proposed construction of a “clean enclave-type highway” that would be partly elevated, providing wildlife crossings and decreasing wetlands impacts, along with minimal interchanges. Compared to the alternatives proposed by FDOT, a Wekiva Parkway built with that concept would provide “environmental results [that] would be far superior,” Lee argued at the time.
佛罗里达州中部第5区FDOT运输业务总监Alan Hyman表示，运输机构同意，并结合了约7,700英尺的高架结构，旨在容纳下面的野生动植物横梁。
Spanning the ‘Wild and Scenic’
Along its 25-mile-long alignment, the expressway’s mainline will both rise and fall. Lowering the elevation is an unusual characteristic for a Florida road project given the usually shallow water table, but it wasn’t a problem given the relatively hilly local terrain. For instance, one roughly 1.5-mile-long stretch of mainline will gradually dive to a depth of nearly 25 ft below its natural elevation in order to minimize visual and sonic disruptions to residents from passing cars.
Precast concrete panels painstakingly designed and stained to a more natural-looking, varying hue will comprise the mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls that support the expressway’s eight interchanges, creating a true “parkway” feel akin to that of the Blue Ridge Parkway, says Donald Budnovich, resident engineer for CFX.
CFX为Bridge Girders选择了混凝土U型束梁，该技术最初是在奥兰多国际机场附近的最近完成的8500万美元沼泽溪交换项目中使用的。Budnovich说，这次，他们正在增加扭曲或“细微差别”：横梁上的仰望。
“It’s an aesthetic feature, but the thought on the engineering side was: ‘We’ve done the curved concrete U-beam, why not try a haunch?,’” Budnovich says. “It’s a nice aesthetic feature.”
CFX and contractor Superior Construction Co. erected the first U-beam girders for the Kelly Park Road bridge, spanning 160 ft, on section 1B in June. Curved concrete U-beams typically have more weight on one side. “When you add a haunch, you’re multiplying the effect because you’re adding more weight to one side than the other, but also end to end,” Aldrich explains.
Perhaps none of those aesthetic touches would be under construction if not for the arduous effort it took to secure U.S. Dept. of Interior approval for the $1.6-billion project’s signature component—the 2,068-ft-long state Route 46 bridge over the “wild and scenic” Wekiva River.
Initially, construction and enviro groups butted heads over the crossing, recalls Callahan. “The environmental community just drew a line and said, ‘You’re not doing this the way you normally do it; we’ve got to come up with some other approach,’ ” he says. “That was kind of the turn that got everybody to the table.”
受1968年《野生与风景河河法》的保护，Wekiva河是国家野生和风景秀丽的河流系统的一部分，其中包括“具有出色的自然，文化和娱乐价值的某些河流”，并保持在“自由流动状态”。透明在单独的分类中，“野生”和“风景”表示河流“没有蓄水池”，通常被认为是“原始”。想想皮划艇和独木舟，而不是摩托艇。
结果，国家公园管理局（NPS）站在项目协调和许可中心。卡拉汉说，起初，NPS对在安静的Wekiva上建造一座新的桥梁的概念持怀疑态度。但是，建造者有一个关键的盟友 - 环保主义者。
卡拉汉说：“与国家公园管理局交谈的道路建设机构不一定会占据很多影响力。”“但是，当您在Wekiva地区及其周围几乎拥有所有环境利益时，告诉公园服务部门，这是正确的事情，就把我们带到了那里。”
李说，计划人员仔细聆听了这些环境利益，决定与当前的低级结构沿着同一路线建造一座桥梁，但比现有结构高约50英尺，从而限制了河流的影响。此举可以发掘现有子结构两端侵犯河流的土壤路堤。提高海拔也将改善娱乐体验；例如，皮划艇运动员和骗子在高潮期间经过桥下时不再需要躲避。
工程师沿着潜在的路径浮动气球，以从水中获得桥梁的观点，反之亦然，这是环保主义者，居民和娱乐用户的重要因素。
为了最大程度地减少河流冲击（包括在Wekiva上施放的潜在阴影），工程师决定了一个三个结构的穿越，每个结构都建造了最多可容纳三个车道。其中两个结构将容纳SR 46沿SR的向东和南行交通，而第三个结构是作为当地服务道路建造的，以促进行人交通。这些结构是通过FDOT征求设计建设提案的估计合同来购买的，并将通过自上而下的建筑建造。
Only a precast segmental, arched-box structure would work, says FDOT’s Hyman, citing pier systems’ potential river impacts and the bridge’s span lengths, the longest of which measures 360 ft. River users wanted a bridge that “more or less blends in with the environment,” and contractors would have to stay out of the river during construction, Hyman says, so cable-stayed or steel truss bridges would not work.
他补充说，建造一个巨大的结构也是一个不做的，因为一座容纳多达9条车道或行人交通车道的桥梁会造成太大的阴影。他说：“将其分成三个平行的桥梁，让更多的河流在河上亮起。”“ [足够的光]是一个很大的问题。”
接下来，在2013年底和2014年初，Wekiva River Bridge Designer Figg Bridge工程师 - 作为第6节的Gai Consultants的亚顾问 - Began领先的设计Charrettes与NPS，FDOT和环境团体，这些志feedback on all aspects of the bridge’s design, including its exact color, the type of railings used, and even the abstract expression of a tree-related theme within the structures’ piers.
卡拉汉说：“最后，尤其是在公园服务的情况下，这变得非常清楚，这可以通过河流的视觉效果和完整性以及河上的娱乐活动来满足他们的需求。”
The process that enabled Wekiva construction is just the start of what construction industry representatives and environmentalists alike agree could be happier trails ahead. “The idea of pulling together a consensus process early in the game, before lines get on paper, is very important,” Lee of FAS says. “There’s value to getting everybody together to try to work things out up front, and to create some more formality to the resolution process. That way, you can go back to decision-makers and carry a much stronger sense of consensus.”
The PD&E study that Callahan and CH2M delivered “has become a model for corridor studies in Florida,” says Hyman with FDOT. “If we didn’t get the stakeholders together early on in the PD&E, I don’t think this would’ve happened the way it did.”
The Wekiva model is informing planners and other stakeholders currently participating in FDOT’s I-75 Relief task force, which is studying concepts surrounding a Tampa Bay-to-northeast Florida corridor.
尽管Wekiva详尽的过程要求uired, at least one project participant remains enthusiastic about future planning efforts. Says Callahan: “I can’t wait to do another one.”
Wekiva Parkway Timeline
1986
Wekiva Parkway的首个概念设计工作正在进行中，而西北地区B部分研究开始新利luck
2000
The Wekiva River is designated a “wild and scenic river,” and thereby safeguarded by the Wild & Scenic Rivers Act. While separate classifications, “wild” and “scenic” denote rivers characterized by being “free of impoundments” and are considered generally “primitive.” The designation would prompt the need for roadbuilders to secure project approval from the Dept. of Interior’s National Park Service, marking only the second time in U.S. history for such project review, according to FDOT officials.
2002
州长杰布·布什（Jeb Bush）创建了Wekiva盆地区域工作队，该工作组有责任分析并建议将Apopka的SR 429（Western Callway）连接到塞米诺尔县4号州际公路的研究区域。新利luck
2003
Gov. Jeb Bush created the Wekiva River Basin Coordinating Committee.
2004
佛罗里达州立法机关通过了Wekiva Parkway＆Protection Act，该法案由州长Jeb Bush签署为法律。法律规定了未来25英里长的公园道的一致性。
2005
Hired by the Florida Dept. of Transportation and the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority, CH2M Hill, now CH2M, begins work to produce the project development and environment (PD&E) study for the Wekiva Parkway, now considered to be the “model” for corridor studies in Florida, such as the ongoing I-75 Relief Task Force.
2011
5月25日，FDOT和OOCEA的官员宣布，一项协议，以建设Wekiva Parkway。当时，Oocea和Florida的收费公路企业表示希望建设可以在2012年底开始。
2012
This year marked a turning point for the project. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) issues a Finding Of No Significant Impact (FONSI), determining that the project “will not have any significant impact upon the environment”—thus precluding the need for a environmental impact statement. Also that year, then-Florida Transportation Secretary Ananth Prasad signed a memorandum of agreement with OOCEA that establishes a funding structure and pushes the long-planned project one step closer to reality.
2013
The DeMoya Group starts work on a $26.7-million design-build contract with the Florida Dept. of Transportation, marking the first construction of the Wekiva Parkway
2015
The Central Florida Expressway Authority starts construction on its first sections of its nearly 10 miles of expressway mainline.
