AWARD OF MERIT: Parking Structures Category

Chapel Hill Street Parking Garage Repairs

Durham, North Carolina

Submitted by Lesco Restorations, Inc.

The City of Durham, NC, owns and operates four daily public parking garages to facilitate traffic in and out of the city. In the summer of 2007, the city contracted an engineering firm to conduct a condition assessment on three of the four parking garages.

One of these four garages is the Chapel Hill Street Parking Garage, constructed in 1970. The garage is a cast-in-place, conventionally reinforced concrete structure with columns and beams with a one-way slab. The parking garage contains nine levels of parking, six of which are structural levels.

The repair of the Chapel Hill Street Parking Garage is a classic example of how teamwork among the owner, the construction manager, the restoration engineer, the material manufacturers and suppliers, and the subcontractors during the repair process met a challenging problem with an innovative solution. This project used concrete fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) strengthening that required a total enclosure of the working environment and heating of the structural member using custom-built electric concrete blankets to meet the repair material application requirements. The contractor used temporary power panels to supply energy to all of the blankets during the 14-day curing process on each level. The project also required shoring towers on every level to stabilize the beams during the curing period while a deck level vehicle access of 70% was maintained during the construction period.

The project was completeled successfully in 4 months by April 2008. This was accomplished by the detailed sequencing, production schedules, and project documentation that were maintained during the project, as well as the innovative approach and cooperative effort of the project participants.

Owner
City of Durham
Durham, North Carolina

Project Engineer/
Designer
Walter P Moore
Houston, Texas

Repair Contractor
Lesco Restorations, Inc.
Spartanburg, South Carolina

Material Suppliers/
Manufacturers
Sika Corporation
Lyndhurst, New Jersey

Guaranteed Supply Company
Raleigh, North Carolina