Road to the Future
University Boulevard Extension

by Scott Blair

The University Boulevard Extension project is only two miles long, but within that short stretch is a massive amount of work: soil excavation, several bridge spans and multiple utility lines, all while staying out of the way of Albuquerque's major international airport.

 

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The roadway will be the first major artery into the 13,000-acre Mesa del Sol, a swath of empty land in the south mesa that city officials see as an area with major potential for development.

Albuquerque-based general contractor A.S. Horner, Inc. is the general contractor on the $24 million extension.

The project began last year and is scheduled for completion in August. >>

The new roadway begins at Rio Bravo Boulevard with four lanes constructed for the first 1,000-ft. After that it drops to two lanes until it reaches the Mesa del Sol area, where it bumps back up to four lanes on the last 1,000-ft.

"The job as a whole has gone great, especially with moving this much dirt," said Patrick Shaw, project manager with A.S. Horner. "We have a total of 2.5 million cu. yds. of dirt to move, including 40-ft. cuts and 50-ft. high fills." All the earth needed for the fills is available on site, so the job will have an estimated excess of nearly 500,000 cu. yds.

The Tijeras Arroyo lies in the middle of the project, a wide depression requiring much of the fill. Crews sub-excavated the wash 15-ft. and then moisture-conditioned it.

Since the project is located in a barren desert-like landscape, dust control is a major issue. The contractor is consuming nearly 100,000 gallons of water a week on the project for dust control and other purposes.

Three, 300,000-gal. ponds were created to provide water for the project. Since the roadway stretches near the Albquerque International Airport, one of the ponds became an issue.

"The Albuquerque Airport told us we couldn't have ponds so close to the runways, so we had to move one of them," Shaw said. The reason given by the airport was that theoretically birds could flock to the pond for water, and could provide a risk to airport traffic if one of the birds collided with an airplane.

"It was a big issue to fill up the trucks at the bottom of the hill and then drive up."

The scope of work also includes major utility work, including a 54-in. sewer line.

During construction, a bypass diverted the flow, which was only supposed to be 43 cu. ft. per second. However, engineers measured the flow and it was really 57 cu. ft. per second, according to Shaw, so additional pumps had to be brought in, and 382-ft. of the new sewer line was installed in less than 10 days.

The project also contains one-mi. of 24-in. sewer line and two-mi. of 24-in. water line.

 
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