Corridor H Final Design, Grant County, WV

Buchart Horn provided preliminary and final design services for an approximately two-mile segment of Corridor H near Greenland Gap in Grant County, WV. The project also included two major bridges and one minor stream crossing.

Initially, we were responsible for a watershed-based study of the effects of several alignment alternatives on a major four-lane highway on new alignment. The project site was in a naturally sensitive area surrounded by historic rural residential villages, dense old growth forests, vast agricultural lands, pristine high quality streams, habitat for rare and endangered species, and a unique geological feature – the Greenland Gap.

Buchart Horn evaluated the existing preferred alternative and compared it to two options on an environmental basis. The study not only looked at the direct impact to the immediate surroundings, but also the impacts each alternative would have on the entire watershed and sub-watersheds. The technical report generated from this study was an in-depth evaluation of each watershed and sub-watershed and how it would respond to various alignment options. The results were recommendations on how to avoid environmentally and culturally damaging impacts associated with the project.

Subsequent to these studies, Buchart Horn performed design for the Bismarck to Forman section, a 2.39-mile section of four-lane, limited-access highway. Notable elements of this section included two major dual structure bridges. One set of bridges consists of five spans crossing Grant County Route 1. The westbound bridge is 1,040 feet long and the eastbound bridge is 1,060 feet long. The second set of bridges carries the highway over Grant County Routes 1 and 42/3, North Fork Patterson Creek, and an active stone quarry. The westbound 1,113-foot bridge and the eastbound 1,107-foot bridge each consist of six spans.

Maintenance of traffic, permit acquisition for major drainage and earthwork activities, and limitation of impacts to the operations of the stone quarry were among the additional challenges addressed during the design phase.