HokieSeas's Journal: Big Dig Questions

For those up a yonder in the Boston area....what else is still going on with the Big Hole, er....Dig....project? I caught this from one of my civil engineering newsletters today:

Six employees from the Big Dig's largest concrete supplier were arrested earlier this month on federal charges of falsifying records to hide the fact that poor-quality (commingled, left-over) concrete allegedly was being delivered and used on the project.

According to the FBI, the six current or former employees of Aggregate Industries (a subsidiary of Holcim Ltd.) face a variety of charges, including making false statements, mail fraud, and conspiracy to commit highway fraud. The allegations against the employees stem from a whistleblower suit filed last year.

Aggregate Industries defends the quality of its concrete, saying that it never delivered any concrete that did not meet contract requirements. Further, authorities say that if any poor concrete was used on the Big Dig, they would have found the problems by now because the concrete was delivered six years ago.

I recall hearing about problems with the project shortly after it opened but those were related to bad seals or tiling on some of the tunnel ceilings causing water to drip into the roadways, but I was a bit surprised to see this. Typically when installing concrete on a job you take samples of the concrete the day it is installed on a job site then test it at 3 days, 7 days, then 28 days and at that point the concrete should be cured to its final strength and any problems with the mix or install you would of found by then, like the concrete company said.

So what other problems are they having up there? Management? Political? Over running budgets?

oh where to start

[blinder]

holy crap... you can't say "big dig" around here and not get a roll of the eyes, or a snicker. its about corruption, crony-ism, politics and more corruption.

the darn thing leaks! leaks! and the stuff they used to "patch" the leaks falls down and is quite dangerous... and yes there are the arrests. those are a good thing.

solemn could tell you a lot more, but for more information, go to boston.com. they've done a pretty good job covering the entire story.

Re:oh where to start

[SolemnDragon]

they have to file variance reports every time the concrete doesn't meet the specs.

I temped for one of the companies working on the central artery part and got to file some of those.

Ye gods. They knew about the problems, but couldn't just go back and redo all of it.

let me put it this way: I hate driving through it, because sooner or later, somebody's gonna die.

there was corruption upon corruption, problem after problem. After a certain point it became a cash cow for those involved. Not just the suppliers, or

It's, It's, It's....

[Degrees]

Highway Robbery!!!

(sorry. just had to.)

(ok - you caught me. i'm not sorry.)