With the nation's 250th birthday just a year away, Philadelphia is busy preparing to commemorate that event. The city had a foundational role in those history-making events and the celebrations promise to be memorable.
The city is working with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and other entities to create an unusual park that could play a role in the festivities. Although it will not be completed by America's Sesquicentennial Celebration, the 11.5-acre park should bring a lot of pleasure to locals and visitors hoping to maximize their visits to this historic city. The job is expected to be completed in early 2029.
The aptly named Central Access Philadelphia (CAP) seeks to place a "cap" on top of busy roadways, including Interstate 95, at the eastern edge of the city. The CAP will be a concrete lid on top of the highways that will enable people to walk or bicycle from downtown's historic areas to Penn's Landing at the Philadelphia waterfront. There, people will be able to take in the waterfront views, enjoy restaurants, amusements and hotels. Meanwhile, the traffic will continue to flow unencumbered beneath the park.
Buckley photo
Along the way, people will be able to pause at the greenspace on the cap to relax under some 100 trees, catch a concert or even go skating in the winter. Making this dream come true will require some big muscles and big plans. Buckley & Co. will be bringing it all together as the general contractor for the cap job. Chad Lavallee PE, project manager of Buckley, will be coordinating an army of subcontractors with an equally impressive army of equipment for the job. The price tag for the work is $340 million.
The lid of the cap will be comprised of an 8-in. slab of concrete, complete with troughs to hold the trees. Of course, a lid like this will require enormous support from steel beams and a sturdy steel web to connect the beams to the concrete lid.
Setting Steel
Workers are setting the steel pilings and footers that will support the cap. The Buckley team is working with High Steel Fabricator from Lancaster, Pa., to produce the steel and Connell & Co to install the steel girders to support the CAP. Workers will be using 240 girders, most of them 130 ft. long. By mid-July, the team had the first set of 80 girders placed over I-95 southbound. Workers hope to have another set of 80 girders hoisted into position over northbound I-95 in the summer of 2026.
Lavallee describes the cranes used for this work as "huge." Buckley has used a 250-ton Kobelco crane for the work, assisted by a 200-ton Kobelco. "We had to use stretch trailers to bring in the beams," said Lavallee. "We are using 100-ton Manitowoc cranes to place the cross braces between the girders to stabilize everything."
American Pile is playing a key role by driving caissons 6 ft. in diameter to provide the footings for the support. The cap plan calls for 26 of these caissons to be installed. The team will be using a Liebherr 45-ton for this work, including coring through concrete. American Pile also has been using a Junttan pile rig on site driving 24-in. pipe piles into the ground. "Our team will be drilling into the bedrock to make sure we have a solid foundation for the bridges to support the cap. We have run into some obstructions while drilling for the caissons, but we will work through that."
Lavallee and the construction team will be starting two retaining walls this summer. The team will be using 80,000 cu.-yds. of Ultra-Lightweight Foamed Glass Aggregates (UL-FGA). This material is made from 99 percent recycled container glass and is 85 percent lighter than traditional materials. It is produced by a local contractor, AeroAggregates.
Working in tight spaces with active roadways is challenging. Workers and equipment have been equal to the task.
"JPC Group has been doing a great job of rerouting sewers," said Lavallee. "That part of the work is about 75 percent finished. We needed that room to build some of the Front Street abutments."
While construction for the cap is happening, parallel work has proceeded in a nearby parking lot.
Buckley photo
"People entering the park from the south side will use a pedestrian bridge to get to the cap. When the south side pedestrian bridge is finished, it will be rolled into place. The cable-stayed bridge will weigh about 1,000 tons but building it away from the highway is much safer," said Lavallee. Cyclists and pedestrians must now carefully negotiate busy traffic to get to the recently completed Delaware River Trail along the waterfront.
The team will be cooperating on another heavy lift — relocating massive memorial statues that had to be moved away for the construction project. The bronze Irish monument weighs six tons, while the granite Scottish memorial weighs about 30 tons.
When the support structures for the cap are complete, Buckley will be partnering with Daniel Keating Company and Delaware River and Bay Authority (DRBA) for the final build-out of the lid for the cap. The new park will be called the Park at Penn's Landing and will link Philadelphia's historic downtown and the scenic Delaware River. CEG
