The town of Breckenridge, Colorado is constructing a new water treatment plant, intake structure and raw water pump station that diverts and transports water from the Blue River, and treated water to the existing North Tank. The facility is being constructed on old dredge tailings consisting of very loose to medium dense sands and gravel with various amounts of silt.
Based on the variability of the soil the owner selected stone columns to provide densified soils so that spread footings and slabs on grade could be utilized for building foundations. Our team used a Liebherr 8100 to install 640 stone columns to depths up to 45 feet. Pre-drilling was performed with a BG-20 to break through a 5 to 8-foot-thick cap over the dredge tailing consisting and various boulders and large river cobbles.
