January 29, 2016
The Belfast Maintenance and Storage Facility (MSF) is a key feature of the Confederation Line, Ottawa’s new $2.1 billion Light Rail Transit project. The MSF is where the Line’s 32 Light Rail Vehicles will be assembled and subsequently stored and maintained. To mitigate unwanted noise for their neighbors, the project partners turned to a Tuf-Barrer (Reflective) solution from AIL Sound Walls.
Rail noise reduction wall installed in poor foundation soils
The site had an approximate 2 m depth of fill on the surface which meant either removing the fill and replacing it with engineered fill or using longer posts to reach to the competent soils below the fill. The wall design also had a wide sweeping curve that needed to be accommodated as efficiently as possible.
Despite the depth of the fill soils, it was determined that the wall was more economical and easier to construct by leaving the fill soils as they were and increasing the depth of the foundation piers and posts.
The panel length selected for this project was 3.6 m (11.8 ft). We were able to accommodate the gentle curve of the wall design without any additional costs — as the change in angle between each post was within our tolerances without modification to the panel lengths or post configurations. The finished wall was 179 m (587 ft) long with varying heights of 6 m (19 ft) and 6.5 m (21 ft).
Material was delivered on schedule and the project came together on time and on budget.
