1. DESIGN, CONSTRUCTION AND PROJECT DELIVERY
TheMilitaryEngineer• November-December• 201258
The Olmsted Locks and Dam replacement
project on the Ohio River is estimated to
cost $3.1 billion and to be fully completed
by 2024. The project is proceeding with a
significant focus on efficiency, including
incorporating lean construction principles
in the production management schedule
along with other measures to save time and
money. PHOTOS COURTESY USACE
DESIGN, CONSTRUCTION AND PROJECT DELIVERY
TheMilitaryEngineer• November-December• 201258

2. DESIGN, CONSTRUCTION AND PROJECT DELIVERY
TheMilitaryEngineer• No. 680 59
BY DAVID DALE,P.E.,PMP,M.SAME
Forward Operating Base Shank may
be 6,957-mi from the Olmsted Locks and
Dam project in southern Illinois, but one
U.S. Army captain is finding out that plan-
ning and execution at the two locations is
not so far apart.
Capt. Dave Burrier, USA, is a U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers (USACE)
Project Manager assigned to the largest
navigation project on the busiest stretch
of inland waterway in America. Under
construction 17-mi upstream from the
confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi
rivers, the Olmsted project eventually will
replace both of the antiquated and dete-
riorating locks and dams 52 and 53.
The twin 1,200-ft lock chambers built
by the joint venture Atkinson, Dilling-
ham and Lane on dry ground inside a 60-
acre cofferdam were completed in 2002.
USACE, after studying various methods
for constructing the dam portion, opted
for an innovative method called “in-the-
wet.” Sections known as shells and weigh-
ing up to 3,700-T are cast on land and
transported by crane, cradle and barge
into the river where they are set in place
atop a foundation of 24-in-diameter pipe
piles. Once the shells are set, the void be-
tween the pipe piles and the shell is filled
with tremie concrete. The work has been
compared to building with LEGOs—only
on a significantly larger scale and with real
-world implications. The dam contract
was awarded to the joint venture Wash-
ington Group (URS)-Alberici in 2004 and
the contractor began placing the concrete
dam monoliths in 2010.
One of the great challenges has been
dealing with the river’s constantly chang-
ing elevation and velocity. Those variables
also have meant managing the project’s
constrained cash flow. In Afghanistan,
Capt. Burrier relied on an operations cen-
ter, a “war room,” to help him prepare to
lead his platoon on patrols to clear enemy
explosive devices. Now this 26-year-old
Purple Heart recipient and civil engineer
is keeping his finger on the pulse of sched-
ule execution variances on behalf of the
Olmsted project management team. His
evaluator and reporter status is what finds
him in a “war room” with a different pur-
pose on the banks of the Ohio River.
CENTRAL CONTROL
The contractors’ operations control cen-
ter is housed in a cluster of trailers on the
edge of the casting yard where the heav-
ily steel reinforced dam shells are fabri-
cated before being placed in the river. On
its four walls are white dry-erase boards
covered in sticky-note paper in a variety
of colors: red for iron workers, blue for la-
borers, orange for carpenters, and so on.
They represent a three-week work pro-
duction plan in single-day increments. At
daily 8 a.m. meetings, three dozen super-
intendents, engineers, quality inspectors
and managers representing all the con-
struction sectors and trades coordinate to
make sure they have the equipment, ma-
terials, manpower and access their crews
need to accomplish their tasks. Later,
foremen will brief their own work crews
so they can safely and efficiently translate
the instructions into action.
This detailed preparation and tracking
is known as Assured Production Planning
and Control, one of five components that
make up the Construction Project Pro-
duction Management System (CP2Ms®),
which was instituted at Olmsted in 2011.
Upstream preconstruction planning,
value stream production planning and
detailed individual operation produc-
tion planning are components completed
prior to the boards getting populated
with the sticky-notes. CP2Ms® includes
concepts found in lean construction, the
Toyota Production System and produc-
tion systems developed by Construction
Concepts, a Greensboro, N.C., construc-
PlanningNewSolutions
Incorporating lean construction and other production efficiencies is
helping deliver a multi-year, multi-billion, locks and dam project.
TheMilitaryEngineer• No. 680

3. DESIGN, CONSTRUCTION AND PROJECT DELIVERY
TheMilitaryEngineer• November-December• 201260
tion production management consultant.
Improvement in the quality of the work
is one of the many pluses this system has
brought to the dam construction. In 2011,
for instance, there were 26 non-confor-
mances. Of the mere five through the first
half of 2012, two were carryovers from the
year before. From carpenters to cost con-
trol managers, all team members share in
production planning and control. Con-
sider that the concrete alone being used
on the Olmsted Dam shells can contain
up to six ingredients and the largest pours
of 6,000-y³ equates to 400 truckloads.
Project-wide logistics, if everyone was not
engaged and on the same page, would be
problematic to say the least.
Action learning teams played a major
role in the early stages of implementing
this production management system. The
trades who perform the work are included
in the process, involving them in solving
strategic or project-wide problems. In ad-
dition to finding practical and economi-
cal fixes, this has led to the emergence of
many new leaders among the labor force.
The management system being em-
ployed at Olmsted also emphasizes ac-
countability and planning. A “prevent and
assure” process is more proactive than the
standard “detect and correct” approach
used in traditional project management
control systems. It prevents waste from
getting into the system and assures work
production flows as planned.
LEAN CONSTRUCTION
When USACE decided the prime dam
contractor should incorporate a lean
construction system, a variety of fac-
tors in addition to terse river conditions
had been pushing costs well beyond the
original estimate on the cost reimbursable
contract. The genesis of “Operation Dam
Excellence,” as Olmsted Dam perfor-
mance improvement is officially known,
came during a meeting in 2010 when
USACE Louisville District directed WGA
to have a consultant apply lean.
Construction Concepts followed up its
first site visit in August 2010 with a pro-
ductivity audit in the casting yard because
it was the section with the most labor
and risk. In November, the firm started
filming, photographing and interviewing
crafts workers on the job, getting them
to complete questionnaires and sitting in
work planning meetings. The consultants
recommended a roadmap to pursue the
operational goals of productivity, safety
and quality.
Once management was on board, the
trades were brought in with town hall
meetings, brochures, fliers and fact sheets
in their pay envelopes that described
CP2Ms®. A temporary operations control
center was set up in February 2011. The
permanent site followed in November.
In addition to production control as-
semblies and crew huddles at the start of
each shift, there is a weekly meeting of
key contractors and USACE representa-
tives known as the “guiding coalition.”
This group provides vision and leadership
to continue to incorporate the production
management strategy. The coalition’s goals
are to incrementally raise performance ex-
pectations and to perfect the production
processes through continuous learning.
By June 2012, there were clear improve-
ment in safety, quality and production.
Work spaces were more organized. There
had been a sharp reduction in rework and
the number of hours required to complete
assignmentswasdownconsiderably.Ayear
ago, the third stilling basin shell (SBS-3)
was built in two shifts of 60-hours per
week. This year, SBS-5, which is roughly
the same size, is being built on one shift of
40-hours per week in the same duration.
While just one example, such savings,
when added up, will go a long way on a
project that has a total estimated cost of
$3.1 billion and a scheduled completion
date more than a decade away.
ONGOING PROCESS
When USACE selected in-the-wet dam
construction, studies had shown it would
lower costs, shorten the timeframe, be less
disruptive to navigation and have fewer
negative environmental impacts. Since
then, experience has shown this method
to be more expensive and time consuming
than originally envisioned. Currently, the
dam construction methodology itself was
under review and cofferdams were being
considered to complete the navigable pass
portion of the dam.
If construction continues using in-the-
wet and there is steady funding, the Olm-
sted Locks and Dam are scheduled to be
operational in 2020. Wet or dry, the to-
tal project should be completed by 2024,
including the demolition of locks and
dams 52 and 53. Either way, USACE will
continue to leverage the best practices of
the private sector and apply effective and
efficient production management to the
Olmsted Locks and Dam project.
David Dale, P.E., PMP, M.SAME, is Deputy
District Engineer, Olmsted, USACE Louisville
District; 502-315-6104, or david.f.dale@usace.
army.mil.
The project management approach being employed at the Olmsted Locks and Dam project—including
weekly guiding meetings between key contractors and USACE representatives—is built on a“prevent
and assure”system rather than the standard“detect and correct”approach.