HONORABLE MENTION: Water Structures Category

Rehabilitation of Charlotteburg Reservoir Dam

West Milford, New Jersey

Submitted by Sika Corporation

The Charlotteburg Reservoir Dam is a vital resource to the State of New Jersey, providing most of the drinking water to the cities of Newark, Bellville, Cedar Grove, and Livingston. It was built in 1960 when the Pequannock River was dammed upstream to create the reservoir. Other than minor repairs, no rehabilitation had taken place on the dam or reservoir during the past 43 years that it has been in service. The reservoir has a total capacity of 3 billion gal. and approximately 45 to 60 million gal. flow out of the structure each day for the cities that it serves. It is located approximately 35 mi northwest of Newark and about the same distance from New York City.

The Charlotteburg Dam was plagued with a number of serious problems, including very large voids (over 2 ft in depth) in the face of the spillway, deteriorated concrete on the spillway and wing walls, leakage and water infiltration into the maintenance buildings and tunnels beneath the dam, and large cracks and leaking joints throughout the structure.

The contractor was challenged with repairing all this deteriorated concrete while still maintaining full service of the reservoir. In addition, the owner and contractor were under additional scrutiny as a result of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2003. Dams and reservoirs, especially in the New York metropolitan area, were under heightened alert by the Department of Homeland Security due to the concern of contamination from chemical or biological agents. This made the project even more challenging than under normal circumstances.

Owner
City of Newark
Newark, New Jersey

Project Engineer/
Designer
Civil Dynamics
Stockholm, Sweden

Repair Contractor
Hutton Construction
Cedar Grove, New Jersey

Material Supplier
Associated Technologies, Inc.
Camden, New Jersey

Sika Corporation
Wayne, New Jersey