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The slope to the west of the Hillside Drive location of The Home Depot will keep moving for the foreseeable future, according to a Thompson Rivers University geology professor who has for years used the area as a field-trip aide to show students what unstable ground looks like.

Last week, the big-box hardware store was forced to evacuate and close for days after ground instability led to movement in a support column on the southwest corner of the building.

Now back up and running, the affected section of the store remains closed and support jacks have been installed beneath the impacted columns and beams.

In nature, naturally, hills want to be eroded, TRU geology professor Dr. Nancy Van Wagoner told KTW.

So, you take things from high spots and move them to low spots. Thats what is happening.

Van Wagoner said the slope on the eastern edge of Kenna Cartwright Park was altered when The Home Depot store was built more than 15 years ago.

The outlet opened in June 2003.

A retaining wall on the western edge of the stores parking lot was constructed to hold back the hill, but Van Wagoner said an underground fault has created problems that are evident along nearby trails in Kenna Cartwright Park.

When you undercut the slope, you really need to do something to retain it, she said.

Van Wagoner and her husband, Steve, who also teaches geology at TRU, have been taking students to the slope west of The Home Depot for years, pointing out geological characteristics like cracks in the earth and heaving paths prominent features they say change on a regular basis.

On May 12, The Home Depots Kamloops store was evacuated and closed. Hand-written signs posted on a barricade erected at the parking lot entrance said the cause was unstable ground.

We have engaged structural engineers and teams to ascertain the current situation, one sign read.

Due to structural concerns as a result of ground movement near our store, we are temporarily closing for the near future for the health and safety of our associates and customers, read the other.

The store reopened on May 16, but the southwest contractors entrance remains closed, as does the tool rental section, located near those doors.

An employee of The Home Depot, who was not authorized to speak on the record, told KTW the plan is to shutter the store for an extended period to address the issues in a fulsome manner. The worker said scheduling that work is being complicated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Steps to ensure the safety of The Home Depot have been taken for years in Kenna Cartwright Park, but the problem is not going away.

The issue is most problematic each spring, when snowmelt and rain make the ground wet.

Van Wagoner compared it to building a sand castle. A little bit of water will help the material stay together, but too much can be catastrophic sloppy sand will flatten out.

The problem slope adjacent to The Home Depot is glacial till, Van Wagoner said poorly consolidated material left behind by prehistoric glaciers.

Fifty-five million years ago, an active volcano sat where Kenna Cartwright Park is today, Van Wagoner said, describing it as more active than eruptions in present-day Hawaii.

The glacial till rests up against the volcanic material. When it gets wet, Van Wagoner said, a fault forces material down and toward the store within the slope, buckling up underneath The Home Depots parking lot and, potentially, the building itself.

West of The Home Depot, red metal pipes stick out of the ground in Kenna Cartwright Park. They are used by engineers to measure the slopes water level. On the retaining wall in the stores parking lot, white plastic piping collects water through perforated lines drilled into the hill. It is all an expensive effort to keep the slope where it is.

The problem is not an uncommon one in Kamloops, but Van Wagoner said it usually happens in residential neighbourhoods where slopes are prevalent Juniper Ridge, Aberdeen and Batchelor Heights, among others.

Landslides are a major issue for us here, she said. It depends on the rainfall, it depends on a lot of things that are going on, but these things can change.

According to Van Wagoner, Mother Nature is trying to claw back the slope that was altered when The Home Depot was built in 2003. But, she said, shes confident engineers will be able to figure it out and keep the building safe for the time being.

Im sure the engineers are looking carefully to remediate the situation, Van Wagoner said.

But, if people were to go away, eventually that retaining wall would go away and this glacial till would slide and go back to what we call an angle of repose a very stable slope.

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Sliding slope near The Home Depot a lesson in unstable earth - Kamloops This Week

The East Somerset Railway has announced that refurbishment and construction work on their Museum building and platform has been completed.

Outside, contractors, Wells Roofing have done a fantastic job of restoring the roof & chimney, and platform two surfacing were both finished just before the COVID-19 update.

Resurfacing work was completed in time to allow the volunteers to fit station items like lamps, along with building a retaining wall before the first weekend of passenger trains back in March.

Inside the museum building, extensive repairs or replacement has taken place on the many of floors, ceilings and electrics throughout the building, bring them up to date and fit for services for many more years.

The waiting room requires more attention, with a window needing replacement and new supporting beam to be manufactured.

Walls and ceilings are having wallpaper and paint removed to assess their conditions before redecoration can begin.

For more information or to support the East Somerset Railway, please visit their website here.

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East Somerset Railway Cranmore Station and Museum Work Finished - RailAdvent - Railway News

ITHACA, N.Y. (WHCU) Bids for the East State Street retaining wall project are now being received by the City of Ithacas Controller.

The City provided the following news release with more details:

Sealed Bids for the East State Street Retaining Wall project located in the City of Ithaca, New York will be received by the office of the City Controller at 108 East Green Street, Ithaca, NY until June 2, 2020 at 2:00 PM. The bids will then be opened and read aloud through a Microsoft Teams videoconference. Contractors will receive an email invitation to the videoconference, but must contact Paul Presutti and Tim Logue (see below) in order to receive the invitation. After the bid opening (within 24 hours), the bid tabulation will be emailed to bidders, posted on the City website, and can be made available upon request.

The proposed project provides for the construction of a new retaining wall to replace the existing deteriorating retaining wall along at the west end of the project. The proposed wall will include drilled soldier piles socketed into rock with tie-back anchors. At the east end of the project a new micropile wall will be constructed in front of the existing wall. The project will also include new sidewalk and pedestrian railing. The project is a Unit Price contract including a Base Bid.

BIDS SHALL BE SUBMITTED IN A SEALED ENVELOPE, ENTITLED: EAST STATE STREET RETAINING WALL BID.

Each bid shall be accompanied by a deposit in the amount of: Five Percent (5%) of the Total Gross Sum Bid in the form of a Certified Check, Bank Draft, or Bid Bond. Cash will not be acceptable as a deposit. Bid deposits of all unsuccessful bidders shall be returned promptly upon execution of the contract with the successful bidder.

Copies of the contract documents, listed in the Table of Contents and the List of Contract Documents, may be downloaded and printed from the Citys website at: http://www.cityofithaca.org/bids

Documents may be examined from the website, as well as at the following locations:

City of Ithaca, Engineers Office, 108 East Green Street, Ithaca, NY 14850Erdman Anthony, 145 Culver Road, Rochester, New York 14620Amendments can only be accomplished by means of Addenda issued by the City of Ithaca or its designee. Written questions should be addressed to Paul Presutti, P.E., of Erdman Anthony at presuttipj@erdmananthony.com and copied to Tim Logue at timlo@cityofithaca.org. Questions must be received by 5:00 on May 25, 2020.

The City reserves the right to reject any or all bids and to waive any informality or technicality in any bid in the interest of the Owner. Attention of Bidders is particularly called to the requirements for ensuring that employees, applicants for employment, and contractors are not discriminated against; refer to the Contract Documents for additional information. A DBE participation goal of 3% is required as part of this contract. Each Bidder submitting a Bid to the Owner shall execute and attach thereto, the Certification regarding Equal Employment Opportunity. Although the Bidder is not required to attach such Certification by proposed sub-contractors to his Bid, the Bidder is here advised of this requirement so that appropriate action can be taken to prevent subsequent delay in sub-contract awards.

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City of Ithaca accepting bids on retaining wall project - whcuradio.com

Construction crews began the installation of the new retaining wall at Hermann Heights. Workers were putting the first blocks of the east end of the new wall Saturday morning.

NEW ULM The Kasota stone retaining wall at Hermann Heights Park is no more. Construction crews began removing the wall Monday, April 27, and had it removed by Saturday to start the installation of the new stones. Workers were putting the first blocks of the east end of the new wall Saturday morning.

The original Kasota stone walls on the hillside were erected in 1970 and were experiencing surface and sub-surface water-related problems requiring maintenance regularly.

In August, the city council approved a new wall design recommended by the Hermann Heights Hillside Stabilization Committee.

The new wall will be a three-tier design and feature a curved turn-in to match the Martin Luther College side of the street.

The old Kasota stone was hauled away to site by M.R. Paving to a designated site, but the company has allowed some residents to take the old stones.

Gigi Rysdahl was a fan of the old Kasota stone and plans to use some for a patio. Michael Shaneman recovered several Kasota stones and upcycled them for landscaping purposes.

Shaneman used the stones to create a stone bench in his front yard. The bench was placed facing Garden Street giving anyone seated on it a perfect view of Hermann Monument. It is a simple reminder of the past looking toward the future.

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The old wall is gone | News, Sports, Jobs - NUjournal

With the states shelter-in-place order expiring at the beginning of May, many used the first weekend of the month as a chance to go to the city of Cummings Mary Alice Park, though city officials said the park wont actually be open to non-boating activities until this coming weekend.

Tracy Helms, administrator of the Cumming Fairgrounds and the park, said city officials typically consider Mothers Day weekend the beginning of the parks season and this year wasnt different. What is different is that typically, in the weeks ahead of the opening, the park is opened on the weekends, which has not been done this year due to both social distancing guidelines and a project to repair a retaining wall, which needs to be completed before reopening.

Helms said he was hopeful the project could be done by Saturday, May 9.

Hopefully, we can make it to Saturday and the weather will stay nice and it will all be good, Helms said. I understand people are itching to get out, tired of being at the house, so hopefully we have a light at the end of the tunnel on it.

Helms said previously, the city was following the Army Corps of Engineers lead on the lake and keeping the park closed while having the boat ramp open and has posted signs letting visitors know of the change.

Now, whether or not people abide by those rules is a different story, he said.

Over the weekend, many of the parking spots big enough to fit boat trailers were taken up by vehicles without trailers. Those visitors were using other parts of the park.

The problem were having is there are some car parking spaces in the boat ramp parking lot, but when those fill up, the cars are taking up the spaces that are designated for the trucks with trailers, Helms said.

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Despite recent heavy use, Mary Alice Park plans to officially open this weekend - Forsyth County News Online

Each spring, usually around the end of April and well into May, shad move to the shallows to spawn and the first couple of daylight often produces line stretching action on every game fish species in the lake. Catfish, white bass, hybrids and stripers and largemouth bass move into the shallows to feed on the easy pickings.

A fishing trip this past week with Cedar Creek Lake guide Jason Barber proved this statement to be spot on. The trick is getting on the water at first light, throwing the cast net a couple times somewhere near the shoreline in shallow water to catch shad for bait and then heading, post haste to a windblown shoreline. On last weeks outing, my buddy Jeff Rice and I met Barber and his son Jacob at Sandy Shores Marina at daybreak. The father and son team caught bait with a couple tosses of the cast net and we were off to fish along a rock bulkhead.

Many years ago, I was visiting with my longtime friend, the legendary Bill Dance. I remember commenting to Bill that the wave action had pushed shad up close to the shore, which was the reason for the great bass fishing.

Bills reply made a lot of sense to me. Luke, dont you think these shad can swim where they wish to, even against the current? Its not the wave action that causes them to be up shallow during early morning. Its the zooplankton on the submerged vegetation that the shad are feeding upon that causes them to go shallow at night in the warmer water and remain there the first couple hours of daylight during their spawn.

Id been aware of the excellent shallow water fishing because of the heavy presence of shad for years but until my friend explained the cause to me, I never fully understood the why of their presence each spring.

As Barber eased the throttle back on his boat an easy cast from the rock retaining wall, Jacob dropped the anchor and the boat came about on a taunt anchor rope. We soon had threadfin shad rigged on small, stout hooks with just enough weight to make casting easy.

We have been hammering blue and channel catfish here and big schools of white bass are moving in to feed. We should have no problem getting you guys the makings of a humongous fish fry. says Barber.

We didnt have long to wait for the action to begin. The wake from our boat had no more than dissipated on the waters surface when the blue catfish began hitting our baits. I was connecting with about half the bites, the eater blues, weighing between 2 and 4 pounds were on a very aggressive bite and hitting the baits hard. If we werent ready to set the hook quickly, the fish had the bait and was gone. We all settled down to the current pattern and kept tension on our lines. In a matter of minutes, we had boated ten or twelve fish and then a school of white bass moved in. Their bite was more tentative than that of the catfish, often pecking the bait once and then picking it up in a serious attempt to eat. The trick was to stay attuned to our baits via a taunt line and when we actually felt the weight of the fish, rear back and set the hook. I began cranking the reel handle slowly which caused the shad to move along bottom. With this method, even the slightest bite is detected and the tension on the line often creates an instant hook set.

Out catch was truly a smorgasbord. We even caught several good eating freshwater drum. When Barber asked if we wished to keep and eat them, he gave an understanding nod when I replied that we did. Smaller drum are excellent eating. Barber, who I have fished with for years, and I have a running joke about keeping those slimy trash fish. Drum arent listed as a game fish but they are very hard fighters and tasty when fried crispy in hot cooking oil.

Barbers plan was to fish the leeward side of a submerged point for hybrid stripers after the first couple hours of shallow water action. The wind was a bit too strong for the open water fishing so, with a cooler full of catfish and white bass, we headed to the sheltered side of a point and switched from shad to lead slabs. Im sure more white bass are caught with slabs than any other bait, especially in Texas. The trick here was to make long casts and retrieve by hopping the baits along bottom. We spent thirty minutes or so slabbing for the plentiful and aggressive white bass and then headed back to the fish cleaning station at Sandy Shores.

We Texans are bless with many lakes such as Cedar Creek that provide excellent fishing for several species. We left the lake with several gallons of tasty fillets and that contented feeling one gets from spending time in the outdoors with great friends, good medicine for these trying times we are all experiencing right now.

Contact Luke via his website http://www.catfishradio.org. Guide Jason Barber at http://www.kingscreekadventures.com or call 903-603-2047

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Outdoors: Fishing the spawn, shad spawn, that is - Athens Daily Review

"For him to go above and beyond to focus it down on one kid, it's special. That's a special teacher," said Tatum Hunter, mom of 6th grade student Cade Hunter.

FORT WORTH, Texas As we begin Teacher Appreciation Week, there is plenty of appreciation in Hurst-Euless-Bedford ISD for a 6th grade math teacher. Because in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis, with schools closed and students limited to on-line distance learning, he sometimes makes house calls.

River Trails Elementary, like schools everywhere, is a pretty quiet and lonely place right now. And for students like Cade Hunter, a 6th grader with high-functioning autism, learning at home can be a pretty lonely process too. And one day last week, his online session with his favorite match teacher "Mr. B" was not going well.

"We've circled back around to geometry," Christopher Butts, AKA "Mr. B" said of the course work they are re-visiting after sessions in geometry and algebra ended right before the school closed at the beginning of the coronavirus crisis nation-wide.

And for Cade the word problems were causing a lot of problems.

"Well the first issue was on my end," said Mr. B. "I kept having problems with technology."

So with neither their online meeting nor the concepts properly connecting, Mr. B decided to cut to the chase.

"Eventually I said I'll just come over there."

Cade's mom took a single picture of the driveway class. Mr. B was seated on a front yard retaining wall with a white board perched on top of a plastic egg crate for a desk. Cade sat in the driveway in an outdoor chair with a TV tray to hold his class notes. Properly socially distanced, Mr. B stayed 45 minutes until Cade understood it all again.

"When I got here and we were able to talk face to face, you could tell this is really what he needs more than anything," Mr. B said.

"It's dedication. It is dedication," Cade's mom Tatum Hunter said.

Which is what she wrote on her Facebook page, praising the teacher. "If that's not dedication," she wrote, "I'm not sure what is."

"For him to go above and beyond to focus it down on one kids, it's special. That's a special teacher," she told WFAA. "I mean, he's an amazing teacher."

Last year Mr. B was the Hurst-Euless-Bedford ISD teacher of the year. Now we know why.

"I'm just doing what I think probably most of the teachers that I work with would do, really," he said. "There's a lot of good teachers right now doing a lot of good things, and I wish they could all be recognized. "

Cade's dad, by the way, works in health care. That's why there's a sign for those heroes in their front yard that says "thank you health care workers." And in Mr. B, they say they have another hero too.

"They have great teachers at my school," Cade said.

Great teachers doing great things wherever that school, or that classroom, might happen to be.

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Driveway math: teacher goes the extra mile for socially distanced geometry lesson - WFAA.com

THUMBS UP to Dr. Tammy Donahue for being awarded the West Virginia Council of Teachers of English by the groups executive committee. The honor is given to outstanding classroom teachers who make a positive impact on students and in their school communities. Dr. Donahue is a third grade teacher at Maxwell Hill Elementary in Beckley. She has 23 years experience in the classroom and has also served as assistant principal and principal. She is a graduate of University of Virginia, Virginia Tech University, and Marshall University. Dr. Donahue demonstrates commitment to collaboration, research and the emotional and intellectual growth of students. Donahue says a teachers goal and purpose should be to inspire our students to forever seek new knowledge and understanding that will enable them to make good decisions to positively impact humankind.

THUMBS UPtothe West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine in Lewisburg for continuing its months-long refurbishing of the front lawn area. City officials are also doing their part to spruce up adjacent Lee Street with a repaving project. City council approved a $20,544 bid by Greenbrier Excavating to repave the street. WVSOM undertook demolition of the crumbling retaining wall along Lee Street and added a sidewalk. The school has placed three flagpoles on the front lawn, and the cracked pillars on each side of the stairway have been replaced. Decorative stone is being added to the front of the retaining wall adjacent to the pillars. WVSOM is also installing an electric sign near the Silo Lane entrance to the campus and adding two groups of parking spaces.

THUMBS UPtothe Wyoming County Veterans Memorial now being handicap-accessible. Additionally, construction on two new eight-foot panels in the commemorative wall has been completed and the granite, for the bottom of the new panels, has been installed. The memorial bricks include the veterans name, rank, military branch, and years of service.

THUMBS UPtoBeckley Area Foundation for giving a $1,600 grant to support its Food for Angels program. The award comes from the COVID19 Emergency Response Funding at the Community Foundation. Debra Davis, executive director of One Voice Inc., said the funds would be used to continue to serve snack bags to high-risk school-age students during the health crisis. The Food for Angels program addresses the problem of food insecurities in the home. This program currently serves 360 students in Raleigh County each month with a weekly distribution of snack bags in order to bridge the food insufficiency gap.

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THUMBS UP to excellence in English education and a teacher who delivers it - Beckley Register-Herald

In a report to city council's finance committee, it's finally been revealed just how much the City of Calgary is spending to stabilize a slope in the southeast communities of Douglasdale and McKenzie Lake.

"The value of the work that has been done to date is $21.6 million and the estimated cost at completion is $28 million," states the report.

Work has been ongoing for the past few years. The goal is to stabilize the slope which was gradually slumping into the Bow River valley below it.

Several sections of a city pathway were damaged and that had some residents of the area keeping a watchful eye out their back windows, just metres from the edge of the slope.

The city had contractors place hundreds of concrete piles some as deep as 30 metres to shore up the hillside and build a 300 metre long retaining wall.

The cost of the repairs was known internally last year but city officials refused to release it publicly.

This information is only reaching the public domain now because Coun. Peter Demong called last November for a report to council on the expenditure.

If he hadn't, the figure might have remained confidential for years to come under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act.

Demong tells CBC News he's glad the figure is finally public information.

"Am I happy about it? No. Do I realize that some things are going to cost money? Yeah," said the long-time council member who represents the area.

"I'm always stunned at how much stuff costs. Having said that, we are talking about stabilizing an entire section of a neighbourhood."

The problems with the slope were detected back in 2005.

Following heavy rains in 2016, the problem had gotten worse and sections of a city pathway collapsed.

The portion of the pathway on the edge of the slope north of 130th Avenue remains closed to pedestrians and cyclists.

Construction continues at the site and the work is expected to be completed this summer.

Demong said he hopes that the city's planning department will take into account the possibility of similar situations elsewhere and will prevent anything from being built too close to the edges of slopes.

"I know of several that could come along those lines. We're talking Cranston. There's Legacy. There's a whole lot of little areas all through the city that could become potential issues," said Demong.

The report notes that a monitoring program is in place to guard against any more problems on the slope and that future work may be required if the slumping continues.

Originally posted here:
City reveals $28M price tag to shore up slumping southeast slope - CBC.ca

The Sandy Springs Police Department has arrested two suspects trying to elude officers in a stolen car during an incident that looked like it came straight out of an action movie or Dukes of Hazard script.

According to a news release, April 30 just after 4 p.m., officers were in the area of Dunwoody Place and Northridge Road when they say a white 2008 Range Rover that had been stolen earlier in Douglas County.

As they tried to stop it, the Range Rover fled, hitting two police vehicles. It then drove west on Northridge Road, crossing over Roswell Road and entering a shopping center located at 8290 Roswell Road.

The vehicle, in an attempt to elude officers, drove to the rear of the shopping center at a high rate of speed, going through a fence and driving off of an 18-foot-high retaining wall, travelling approximately 65 feet before landing in a wooded area in between the shopping center and the Veridian at Sandy Springs Apartments (1800 Windridge Drive), the release stated. The driver and passenger of the Range Rover were taken into custody and were transported to a local hospital to receive medical treatment for their non-life-threatening injuries sustained during the incident. No officers or pedestrians were injured during this incident.

The driver was identified as Dylan Crutchfield, 18, of LaFayette, and the passenger was identified as Janard Kirksey, 36, of Sandy Springs. Both suspects had outstanding warrants from other jurisdictions, including an aggravated assault warrant for Kirksey.

Crutchfield was charged with reckless driving, red light violation, failure to maintain his lane, theft by receiving stolen auto, theft by receiving stolen firearm, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, fleeing to elude and hit and run.

Kirksey was charged with possession with the intent to distribute cocaine, possession with the intent to distribute marijuana, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and two counts of theft by receiving stolen property.

Police said more charges are possible for both suspects both regarding the Sandy Springs incident and the alleged theft of the Range Rover in Douglas County, where authorities are working with the Douglas Sheriffs Office on that part of the investigation.

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Sandy Springs Police have arrested two suspects in a wild hit-and-run case - MDJOnline.com