The 32-mile pipeline built to carry water from Lake Ralph Hall, the new reservoir Celina is counting on to expand its water supply, has been named Texas Project of the Year by Engineering News-Record, the construction trade publication.
ENR also named the Upper Trinity Regional Water District project the best water and environment project in its Texas awards, according to a write-up published Wednesday. The conveyance system includes 66- and 72-inch steel pipe, a balancing reservoir and a delivery point that ties into an existing 72-inch transmission main. It is designed to carry up to 54 million gallons a day.
Under budget
Construction began in 2023. The district brought in contractor Garney under a construction-manager-at-risk arrangement when design was about 30% complete, which let the team time its purchase of steel pipe as prices swung after the pandemic, according to ENR. The final contract came to $254 million, $14 million below the original guaranteed maximum price, and the project finished on schedule.
"We were still coming out of COVID, steel prices were crazy and this was 32 miles of steel pipe," Ed Motley, the district's program manager, told ENR.
Crews hand-mined 22 tunnels under roads, railroads and creeks and bored a 1,600-foot tunnel beneath the South Sulphur River. The job logged 455,000 work hours without an OSHA-recordable injury, the publication reported.