Location
New York, New York
Date
15 Apr 2004, 10:45am - 12:00pm
Abstract
The East Side Access Project to connect the Long Island Railroad to New York’s Grand Central Terminal on the east side of Manhattan will be one of the largest tunneling projects ever undertaken in New York. A series of tunnels and caverns will be excavated in rock to connect the existing 63rd Street tunnels to twin three-level caverns beneath Grand Central Terminal. The site investigation for the Manhattan Segment comprised archive searches, rock exposure mapping, geophysical surveys, test borings in soil and rock, in-situ testing, groundwater monitoring, and laboratory testing of soil, water and rock. Approximately 200 borings have been drilled along the alignment from the existing tunnels at 63rd Street and 2nd Avenue to 38th Street and Park Avenue. Specialized investigation methods included oriented core borings and televiewer surveys to determine the dip and dip direction of the discontinuities, drilling at angles to intercept specific geological features such as faults, shear zones, geological markers and altered rock. Extensive local rock exposure mapping was carried out to correlate the core orientation data thereby establishing a specific structural model for the project. The data have been interpreted to provide a geological model for the Manhattan segment of the project. This paper focuses on the philosophy and description of the methods of geological characterization undertaken, presents a comprehensive discontinuity reference and engineering properties of the rock mass.
Department(s)
Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Meeting Name
5th Conference of the International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering
Publisher
University of Missouri--Rolla
Document Version
Final Version
Rights
© 2004 University of Missouri--Rolla, All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Document Type
Article - Conference proceedings
File Type
text
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Sarkar, Subal; Mukherjee, Amitabha; Benslimane, Aomar; and Stewart, Carroll, "Geotechnical Investigation and Rock Characterization for the East Side Access Project’s Manhattan Segment" (2004). International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering. 3.
https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/icchge/5icchge/session11/3
Geotechnical Investigation and Rock Characterization for the East Side Access Project’s Manhattan Segment
New York, New York
The East Side Access Project to connect the Long Island Railroad to New York’s Grand Central Terminal on the east side of Manhattan will be one of the largest tunneling projects ever undertaken in New York. A series of tunnels and caverns will be excavated in rock to connect the existing 63rd Street tunnels to twin three-level caverns beneath Grand Central Terminal. The site investigation for the Manhattan Segment comprised archive searches, rock exposure mapping, geophysical surveys, test borings in soil and rock, in-situ testing, groundwater monitoring, and laboratory testing of soil, water and rock. Approximately 200 borings have been drilled along the alignment from the existing tunnels at 63rd Street and 2nd Avenue to 38th Street and Park Avenue. Specialized investigation methods included oriented core borings and televiewer surveys to determine the dip and dip direction of the discontinuities, drilling at angles to intercept specific geological features such as faults, shear zones, geological markers and altered rock. Extensive local rock exposure mapping was carried out to correlate the core orientation data thereby establishing a specific structural model for the project. The data have been interpreted to provide a geological model for the Manhattan segment of the project. This paper focuses on the philosophy and description of the methods of geological characterization undertaken, presents a comprehensive discontinuity reference and engineering properties of the rock mass.
