[PRCo] Re: [Fwd: Transnet 113]

[John Swindler]

>roger asked:
>
>Lost in all this news is the Puerto Rico DMU  LRV line that is recieving 
>cars from Seimens in LA area who ships these cars on UP thru the Port of 
>Houston. I have seen several 89ft flat cars with these cars wrapped up in 
>canvas covers pass thru on Beaumont Hill. All you can see is the wheels of 
>them. Two weeks ago, two more cars went east and caught them on Video. Any 
>body know anything about this line ??? I have not seen anything about it, 
>except P.Allen Copeland , author of those PERY color books, told me that 
>was where these cars were going. cheers- Rogertrolley  PTM #1665



Unless there is a second LRT line in Puerto Rico, those are electric cars, 
not DMU.  Cars assembled at Siemens plant near Sacramento.  Bill Vigrass was 
one of the consultants working on the rolling stock for this project, I 
think in quality control.


Would this article from Railway Age suffice??

Why the lack of interest by US railfans??  Perhaps its considered "foreign", 
even though part of US DOT budget.

Would you be surprised that it is a federal "New Start" project; just like 
Pittsburgh's Overbrook line overhaul?

John



Railway Age
COVER STORY TRANSIT (1/17/2000)

Twisting and Turning through San Juan;  Tren Urbano brings transportation 
expertise to island and relief to its congested capital

Waiting in the nonstop crush of traffic that marks the streets of the Puerto 
Rican capital of San Juan, motorists along one 17.2-kilometer stretch can 
see a column rising in the air alongside an office building in the city's 
Hato Rey section, or the shell of a future station forming in Martinez 
Nadal, or bridge segments rolling along a traveling truss in Bayamon. The 
tunnels, tracks and stations of the Tren Urbano mass transit system hold a 
promise of less congestion for this independent-spirited U.S. territory and 
also a growing local experience in transportation construction for the next 
generation.

Seven contracts worth a total of $1.24 billion are in full swing for the 
first phase of Tren Urbano, Puerto Rico's first-ever turnkey design-build 
project. Those contracts, the bulk of a total $1.7-billion effort, were 
awarded in 1997 by the commonwealth's Dept. of Transportation and Public 
Works' Highway and Transportation Authority (DTPW). Since then, the 
complicated project has faced hurricanes and a steep learning curve for 
local firms teaming up with outsiders on the first major transit job to come 
to Puerto Rico in 50 years. The challenges have forced a one-year delay in 
Tren Urbano's original 2001 projected completion date. But department 
Secretary Carlos Pesquera contends that design-build has already cut two 
years off the design phase and estimates it will save about $60 million 
during the entire first phase.

The route travels through the heart of metropolitan San Juan, from Bayamon 
on the west side to Sagrado Corazon in the north (see map, p. 34). It is 
estimated that the total 30-minute, $1 ride from end to end will generate 
100,000 daily trips in the first year. According to DTPW, there are 146 
vehicles per square mile in Puerto Rico and Tren Urbano is projected to 
absorb 45% of all private vehicle trips by 2010.

OFFICE WEB More complex than actual construction, the organization of the 
Tren Urbano team is an intricate blend of contractors, DTPW officials, 
quality assurance and control consultants, designers and subcontractors. Los 
Angeles-based Daniel, Mann, Johnson, & Mendenhall and New York City-based 
Frederic R. Harris Inc., in a joint venture with San Juan-based engineers 
Eduardo Molinari and Associates and Barrett and Hale and Associates, signed 
a two-year, $42-million contract in 1994 with extensions for general 
management and architectural and engineering consultant services (GMAEC). 
Six of Tren Urbano's seven first-phase contracts, one a major tunneling job, 
are awarded to joint ventures of local and international firms. The seventh, 
a design-build-operate-maintain contract to build and supply the line's 
vehicles, systems, control center, train yard and shops and test track, is 
held by a Siemens Transportation Systems--led team."We have 150 people on 
GMAEC, not including the highway authority," notes Randy Altschuler, 
director of operations. "There are separate groups even representing the 
owner."

Moreover, almost every contractor has an independent quality control firm on 
the job, adds Chris Dixon, GMAEC's director of implementation. Two of the 
contract managers report to Dixon, while the other five report to the fixed 
facilities manager. There are also seven managers for specialized technical 
and professional support areas of the Tren Urbano office. "It's tough," 
notes Steve Roescher, manager of project administration for Siemens. 
"Workshops, information dissemination; there are so many issues. But it's 
the nature of the best of design-build. You have to make changes as you go 
along...there are disagreements, but there is dialogue."

HANDLING HURRICANES Dixon says most claims now under negotiation have to do 
with site conditions, including delays from Hurricane Georges, which raked 
Puerto Rico in the fall of 1998. Other weather incidents, utility 
relocations and problems in handling concurrent delays also generated 
claims. "We'll sit down and negotiate," says Dixon. "We'll reach a 
settlement." Roescher notes that there were no unusual archeological 
conditions as originally feared, but unanticipated buried utilities have 
been problematic. "It's an aggressive schedule, there are major issues," he 
concedes. "The project will be 10 to 12 months late, but I don't see any 
major court disputes."

Javier Mirandes, GMAEC's deputy project manager for architecture, says 
contractors work with an initial alignment drawing as well as one reflecting 
community input. "We tell the contractor, 'you need to design to 100% with 
this concept,'" he says. The final design is up to the contractor, but the 
highway authority may step in and request changes, which also adds to 
contract extensions. Adjusting to a different culture and to a construction 
community unfamiliar with big transit jobs also proved challenging. "We had 
to push for quality and safety" in the beginning, says Dixon. "We're trying 
to promote the philosophy of prevention." He says there have been three 
fatalities but no abnormally high rates of injuries.

Hurricane Georges set the project timeline back. In its aftermath, "there 
was no availability of materials," says Siemens' Roescher. "Our trucks were 
used for the Federal Emergency Management Agency." The island location also 
limits choices of materials and equipment vendors, he adds. And with road 
and building construction active elsewhere on the island, "there are only so 
many skilled laborers," Roescher says. "You can't just to go the next state 
and recruit people." U.S. managers have been pulled in to help recruit and 
train residents to take on the work.

PROJECT POPULAR The project nevertheless enjoys strong popular support. 
"People here favor Tren Urbano," says Jeffrey Squires, GMAEC planning 
director. "They ask how late it will go and when it will come to their 
neighborhood." The project is also a major factor in the political future of 
Pesquera, who aspires to be governor of Puerto Rico. "The Secretary has the 
authority to set the program...as he sees fit," says Squires. DTPW is 
funding $962 million of Tren Urbano. Other sources are a $307-million 
federal grant and an additional $400 million of U.S. transportation money 
allotted to Puerto Rico. A direct U.S. federal loan of $300 million under 
the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) last 
year was "a vote of confidence," notes Squires.

"Each station is different and the corridor helps define each," says GMAEC's 
Mirandes. Topology, neighborhood characteristics and space all factor into 
the concept given to the contractor at that station to fulfill. For 
instance, the Jardinez station is built in a retained cut to reduce impact 
on surrounding suburban streets while at Lorimar, the station is 
"half-elevated, half at grade. There is little concession space and no 
desire for major growth," says Mirandes. "We could have integrated it with 
an adjacent shopping center, but we didn't." At stops within urban cores 
such as Bayamon and Hato Rey, however, stations are built with intermodal 
connections to parking lots, ramps, garages and pedesetrian access.

About 40% of Tren Urbano's total line is at grade. The rest is either 
elevated over major streets or underground, where two types of tunnels are 
being built under Rio Piedras. At Bayamon, Grupo Metro San Juan, a joint 
venture of Mexico's ICA and San Juan-based Miramar, is building a 
2.7-km-long elevated guideway of precast concrete segments with single and 
double track spans under a $71-million contract. An overhead launching truss 
places the segments, which vary from 21 m to 31 m because of a 90° curve and 
approach ramps. The guideway, in one section elevated 17 ft above a parking 
lot, passes within 20 centimeters of a basketball coliseum on one side and 
baseball stadium on the other.A joint venture of Redondo-Entrecanales holds 
four contracts encompassing nine stations and about 13 miles of track. The 
guideway at Bayamo travels into a corridor originally meant for a highway 
and ends below grade at the Jardinez station. Siemens' systems and track 
contract include the next two stations at Torrimar and Martinez Nadal, where 
barrel vault sections make up the roof. Adjacent to a north-south route, the 
station will become a focal point for car and pedestrian access, says 
Mirandes. At Las Lomas, the elevated guideway resumes, but this time in 
match-cast segments of consistent depth. The station is excavated at 30 ft 
near a five-road intersection where the route continues through the Centro 
Medico complex, a major hospital.

GOING UNDERGROUND The most complex alignment contract was awarded to a joint 
venture of Omaha-based Kiewit Construction, Kenny Construction Co., Chicago, 
and San Antonio-based H.B. Zachry Co., with managing designer cma Architects 
& Engineers, for $225.6 million. The Rio Piedras contract provides for the 
construction of 1.8 km of underground track with two stations beneath a 
dense urban area full of historic buildings. "There have been quite a few 
change orders," notes Vinton Garbesi, contract manager.

In one 430-m section, twin tunnels are being driven with an earth pressure 
balance machine. Another 100-m tunnel section is being built using the New 
Austrian Tunneling Method (NATM). A cut-and-cover station is being put at 
the University of Puerto Rico and the Rio Piedras station is built using 
stacked drift construction methods. "It was difficult to get the alignment 
to where it had to be because of the curves," says Garbesi. The guideway 
dips underground at a steep grade to run about 80 ft beneath the groundwater 
table and then rises to a level that provides less than 5 m of cover under 
some historic buildings. Soft soils include silts and sands mixed with 
limestone karst.

The Rio Piedras Station is located in a tunnel 150 m long, 19 m wide and 16 
m high. Fifteen concrete-filled drifts form a horseshoe arch. About 3 m x 3 
m each, the drifts are sequentially excavated to form the station's cavern. 
Soils under the arch are removed and the arch reinforced with concrete. The 
contractor also built a grout gallery to provide access for horizontal 
grouting needed to compensate for settlement. Some 30,000 cu yd of concrete 
was poured in 12 weeks, he says.

SENSITIVITY From the Rio Piedras station to the University of Puerto Rico 
station, twin 6.3 m-dia tunnels are excavated with an earth pressure balance 
tunnel boring machine for about 430 m and lined in one pass with precast 
concrete segments. "It was originally a two-pass system," notes Garbesi, 
"but we proposed a single-pass." The one-pass segmental lining--a 
seven-piece, 250-mm-thick, 1.2-m-wide ring gasketed and bolted--can interact 
better with surrounding soil loads, designers say. Subsurface grouting also 
was done between the tunnels and the spread footings of a university 
building with sensitive scientific equipment, notes Dixon. A robotic 
settlement monitoring system, including mirror prisms installed on 
buildings, also tracks earth movement every 10 minutes in the historic 
downtown. The system is so sensitive that it even records heat-generated 
building expansion.Flexibility and the proximity of two structures in 
downtown Rio Piedras dictated the NATM method for one section of four mined 
tunnels, each about 100 m long and 6 m in diameter, says Garbesi. Two of the 
tunnels are for future extensions.

>From the open cut of the university station, the route heads north into the 
Hato Rey financial district, weaving between buildings and across marterials 
as a 3.5-km elevated guideway. A locally based joint venture of Necso 
(formerly Intercanalas) and Redondo holds the $125.8-million contract, which 
ends at Sagrado Corazon. Jimenez says the route was redesigned to avoid 
interfering with the median of a major avenue and to interface with a new 
coliseum being built and a transportation terminal. North of Sagrado 
Corazon, an environmental impact statement is being done for a proposed 
extension to Manillas.

The $640-million seventh contract is led by Siemens, local firm Juan Requena 
Associates and Boston-based Alternate Concepts, with a quality control 
subcontract to New York City-based Parsons Brinckerhoff and a construction 
subcontract to Redondo-Perini. The team must coordinate interface between 
adjacent alignment contracts and adjust schedules and access. The 
multidisciplinary system seems to work; operation and maintenance experts 
see things that designers and builders might miss, notes Roescher.

The jury is still out on the multicontract approach to design-build, 
officials say. But they all favor a $10-million technology transfer program 
with students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the 
University of Puerto Rico. Students have internships on every contract, and 
several have joined Tren Urbano after graduating, says Lydia Mercado, 
program director. With future extensions planned, "we want to have enough 
locals so we don't have to import talent," she says. "I expect one of these 
students will be the Secretary of Transportation 10 years from now."










>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Harold Geissenheimer" <transitmgr2 at earthlink.net>
>To: <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
>Sent: Friday, April 11, 2003 10:25 PM
>Subject: [PRCo] [Fwd: Transnet 113]
>


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