MARINE: LESS THAN $5 MILLION
Innovative Piering LLC
Horseshoe Casino
Retaining Wall Project
By Micah McRae, Innovative Piering LLC
Innovative Piering was contracted as
a design-build contractor to address
a failure of an existing sheet pile wall.
The sheet pile wall was originally constructed
around 1997 and experienced a
total failure in early 2018. The failed retaining
wall supported site soils and a trucking/
loading dock area. When the wall was
first visited, it showed signs of significant
lateral movement, in the direction of the
river (south). This was documented by photos
and showed movement in excess of 13
inches where the concrete met the sheet
pile wall. Also noted was the ejection of
the existing tension ties/micropile bars,
some of which remained in suspension on
the existing waler beam, and others were
ejected into the river.
This lateral deflection created a hazardous
condition forcing the total closure
of the dock area. It also made for difficult
demolition. Once the area was made safer, a
geotechnical drill collected soil information
to provide the basis for Innovative Piering’s
design solution.
Some of the design considerations for
this project were:
•• Not increase loads on the secondary
retaining wall that carries the roadside
load or depend on the roadside retaining
wall for any additional load
•• Could not damage or alter the existing
roadside retaining wall, as its condition
was immeasurable
•• Permitting by USACE titled the project
as a “maintenance/repair,” so long as we
didn’t change the design style or move
the wall north/south by greater than two
feet
•• The dock and retaining wall structure
needed to be as close to the original condition
as possible
•• The wall needed a life expectancy of a
minimum of 25 years
•• The wall needed to be free draining, not
to be designed to combat hydraulic loads
•• The drainage plan needed to account for
silt infiltration and maintenance of river
sediment deposits
Phase 1: Demolition
This phase included selective demolition
and disposal of the steel and site soils. The
site soils were mostly used to balance the
erosion that had scoured the area outside
of the sheet pile wall. The steel had to be
cut out and removed via crane. Once up to
the roadway, the scrap steel was loaded into
semi-trailers and hauled to a local scrap
yard. As more steel was removed, more
soils were able to be pushed into the voided
‘beach’ bringing the grade to its previous
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