The improvements and implementation of long-postponed maintenance of the streets and utilities in the very busy inner city environment of the 4th largest city in the USA provide exposure to a wide variety of challenges.
A large percentage of those streets were in the
north end of downtown Houston–where Houston began on the banks of Buffalo Bayou. While installing a 30-inch diameter water line on Preston St. we found: a wooden duct bank with teletype cable; many trolley rails and rotten cross ties; old water lines that did not appear on any plans and old gas lines from the original gas street lights. To complicate matters laced into all or that were many fiber optic ducts placed with directional boring so there was no hint when one would be encountered and a way by or around them had to be devised or face the delay of relocation the conduit.
Projects that depict those issues and many others are presented in this section.