Gateway Program Lightweight Fill

Gateway Program Lightweight Fill

The Job

This lightweight fill project is located in Manhattan, New York City.  It is at the Manhattan end of the Gateway Program, which is bringing two new parallel rail tunnels from New Jersey to New York.  The project, administered by Amtrak, is one of the largest, most complex construction projects in the United States. 

CJGeo cellular concrete batch plant onsite at a construction project with a bridge, fence, and Manhattan skyline in the background.

Batching and placing 200CY/hour of CJFill-Ultra Lightweight.

The Challenge

One phase of the project requires tying the new tunnels into existing rail infrastructure at Hudson Yards.  This work is immediately adjacent to where the bored tunnels terminate.  As part of constructing the cut-and-cover tunnels (Hudson Yards Concrete Casing – Section 3), there are large wedges as the two tunnels converge that need to be filled.  The structural concrete contractor reached out to CJGeo about the feasibility of filling the wedges with CJFill-Ultra Lightweight cellular concrete instead of flowable fill.  Their desire to use CJFill-Ultra Lightweight was driven by:

  • logistics (1 load of cement takes the place of 12 loads of flowable fill),
  • reduced liquid head on forms & walls, and
  • faster installation.

The Solution

CJGeo worked with the contractor to design a pour plan which accelerated construction, minimized lateral loads and provided significant cost savings.  Using a dry batch cellular grout plant, CJGeo was able to place lifts as thick as 10 feet at a time, with no consolidation.  CJGeo’s dry batch plants utilize high energy mixing, which facilitates deep placements without consolidation, even in high vibration environments. 

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