德克萨斯州的一项减少洪水风险计划正在寻求少数群体和妇女拥有的小型企业，以便在容易发生洪水的地区缓解低至中度收入社区。

The Halls Bayou Bond Implementation Program includes 14 projects planned to be built over the next five to seven years at an estimated cost of more than $400 million. Construction of two of the projects has already started, and bidding for another opened on Nov. 5 and will close on Nov. 29.

The area along the 20-mile bayou watershed in north-central Harris County, including part of Houston, has a long history of repeated flooding. Dena Green, planning department manager at the Harris County Flood Control District, says about 13,000 homes flooded along Halls Bayou as a result of Tropical Storm Allison in 2001, and 2017’s Hurricane Harvey flooded nearly 12,000 homes in the area. The watershed has faced 14 major floods since 1989, officials say.

哈维飓风后一年，当地选民通过了25亿美元的债券计划为减少洪水风险的项目。18luck官网That bond election included a commitment to pursue outside partnership funding from state and federal agencies for a total planned program value of $5 billion, says Alan Black, interim executive director of the Flood Control District. However, as ENR previously reported, officials have faced some difficulty funding all the projects, facing a gap of as much as$1.4 billion整个地区。

In order to find funding and help the Halls Bayou program run smoothly, the洪水控制区brought on Lockwood, Andrews & Newnam Inc. (LAN) as bond implementation manager. Hiring LAN helpfully turned the program “into a turnkey process,” as the District has faced a nearly tenfold increase in annual project cost size since the bond election, Black says.

他说：“也就是说，LAN可以提供所有员工和支持，以便能够提供计划管理方面的各个方面。”“我们仍然与其他专业服务顾问进行最终工程设计，但这全都在LAN的监督下。因此，这是通过管道更快地通过管道进行更多工作的好方法 - 因为将输出增加十倍，没有一种方法可以完成所有工作。这是许多不同方法的结合。”

佬司n . Zetterstrom副主席dent at LAN, serves as the program manager for the Halls Bayou Bond Implementation. He says the team has turned to grant sources, such as the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, which support minority- or woman-owned small businesses, or low-to-moderate income communities. Despite the area’s flooding history, it has historically not seen large scale improvements. That’s because traditional benefit-to-cost ratio analyses may not account for the greater difficulty people in those communities face when recovering from storms, Zetterstrom says.

“We have been successful in being awarded grant funds from different grant sources, but we’ve also seen that the fact that we are in a low-to-moderate income area does play a role in the justification for decisions to fund various grant sources,” he says. “What I think is great is that, while you have a plan, all plans need to be continuously updated and evolved, and look for alternate funding sources when necessary.”

So far, the county has awarded a $3.5-million contract to Hurtado Construction Co. to build a pair of detention basins, one north of Hopper Road and one between Little York Road and Langley Road. They’re designed to hold 200 acre-ft of stormwater.

The洪水控制区received a $6.3-million grant for the project, but with the winning bid coming in at a lower amount, Zetterstrom says the team is asking the state agency that awarded the grant to allow it to put the leftover money to work on another related project.

“With the remaining bond funds, we’re seeking permission to be able to select an engineer of record to design conveyance improvements between the two detention basins so we can utilize the residual grant funds to maximize the benefits to the people of Halls Bayou,” he says.

这项工作已经面临一些障碍。在容易发生洪水的地区工作表明了对项目的需求。18luck官网

“When your construction and project area is temporarily inundated due to rain events, it does impact the project schedule and unfortunately cause some delays,” Zetterstrom says.

当LAN加入该计划时，该公司将液压建模框架从更狭窄的主干方法转移到了较窄的主干方法，以查看流域的各种支流，以提供更准确的建模。格林说，该团队能够将范围内的流水功能视为系统，而不是单个现场项目。18luck官网这样，这些项目就安排了，因此18luck官网完成后没有无意的负面影响，但另一个仍在待处理之后。他们还能够与其他哈里斯县机构和休斯敦市协调，沿着霍尔·巴尤（Halls Bayou）支流的项目。18luck官网

“I find it exciting to have a program like this in the Halls Bayou watershed where we were able to get funding for so many projects and then have a dedicated team so they’re able to stay on top of all of that and be really efficient with their time and move these projects as quickly as possible,” she says.

The county also awarded a $5.9-million contract to Lecon Inc., which was recently acquired by Resource Environmental Solutions LLC, for the first phase of channel conveyance improvements and the construction of a 180-acre-ft stormwater detention basin along Aldine Mail Route Road. The flood district has about $20 million available for the project’s two phases, about $14.6 million of which is partnership funding, including a $9.5-million Community Development Block Grant for Disaster Recovery.

The next project, currently out to bid, calls for the construction of drainage improvements and a concrete storm box. More details are available on theHarris County online procurement portal.A pre-bid video conference will be held on Nov. 15 and bidding will close on Nov. 29.