DenverInfill Blog

The second concrete pour was done on Friday. I was fortunate to get into the job site to get some close-up photos of the  pour and of the elaborate rebar structure that has been built over the past few weeks.

The photo below is a close shot of the pouring process.  The vertical, black tube coming down from the center is the hose of the concrete pumper that is behind me.  Notice the worker in the blue hard hat.  He is controlling the movement of the boom with a joy stick on a control panel at his waist.  The panel is supported by straps around his shoulders and back.

Below is a photo of the machine you can see in the photo above.  It is used to spread and level the concrete.  There is a plow of the side opposite the operator.  Notice the two vertical rods on each side of the plow.  At the top of those rods are GPS devices that enable the operator to level the concrete at a precise elevation.

This photo of concrete trucks helps to give some scale to the shoring wall.

Here are a couple of shots of workers in a sea of rebar.  The photos demonstrate the depth of the floor and the density of the rebar.  In the photo on the left, you can see dark-colored (raw steel) rebar along the bottom.  The top layer of rebar and the vertical supports are coated with epoxy which makes them green.  Notice in the foreground of the photo on the right how the rebar is tied at the intersections.   That work is done by 8-10 people bending at the waist all day.  (Talk about flexible hamstrings!)

While most of the work is focused on the bus terminal floor, other workers are preparing for the walls.  This photo shows two forms staged along the side of the hole.  Several other forms have been built and are staged elsewhere on the site.  For scale, notice the portable toilet in the background.

Over the weekend, I posted 16 more photos to our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor in addition to four that I posted during the middle of last week.  All of the newest ones were taken from inside the jobsite.

And, finally, here’s a guy who is pretending to be important (me).

Here is the scene at the Union Station redevelopment site at about 8:00am today.

This is the first pour of concrete for the bus terminal floor.  It is something akin to a practice run in preparation for a larger scale effort on Friday.  As I write this, a second concrete pumper is being set up on the opposite side of the hole.

I expect to get some on-site, ground-level photos on Friday and post another blog around the middle of the day.  In the meantime, you can keep up to date on this week’s activity by checking our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor.com.  I will post more photos throughout the rest of the week.

This Union Station update is about rebar and concrete.  Plenty of both.  Construction of the bus terminal floor is in full swing.

Multiple flatbed tractor trailers show up each day with loads of rebar.  Much of it is 60-foot long #10.  At 1.25 inches in diameter and 4.3 pounds per foot, each piece weighs 258 pounds.  Now I know why it takes three guys to carry one piece.

After the rebar is unloaded and staged, the crane “flies” it into the specific work spot at a rate of 2.5 tons per flight.  The base level of rebar is the typical steel color.  Vertical pieces of green rebar are shaped like an upside-down V.  Straight, green pieces are tied to the top of the vertical pieces to form a giant three-dimensional grid. The sheets of membrane that are being installed over the mud slab and under the rebar will adhere to the bottom of the new concrete floor making the terminal water proof.  Here are a couple of photos.

Starting as early as next week, concrete will be poured in 15 sections of varying lengths and widths.  Each of the 15 sections will require 100-140 truck loads of concrete to fill it to its full depth of four feet.   That’s about 2,000 trucks of concrete!  The floor needs to be four feet thick so it can bear the weight of the buses and the structure above, and so the bus terminal won’t float once the dewatering system is dismantled and the water table resumes its normal level.  (I guess if you can float an aircraft carrier, you can float a bus terminal.)  Roadways in and around the construction site are being beefed up and dressed, presumably in anticipation of heavy concrete truck traffic.

Construction of the bus terminal walls is expected to start this month.  In fact, in the upper left corner of the close-up photo above, you can see vertical rebar rising above the floor level.

Remember, this is only half of the eventual bus terminal.  Excavation has not yet started on the Union Station side of Wewatta Street.

If you want to express your opinion of the bridge formerly known at Kinetic Plaza, you should attend the Planning Board meeting tomorrow (August 4) at 3:00pm at the Webb Municipal Office Building, Room 4.F.6.  Here is a link to my blog and your comments on the topic.

Please see our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor.com for 12 new photos this week.