| OTIA III State Bridge Delivery Program |
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| Web Brief (Sep 06) |
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MB&G worked with several agencies for Bundle 202.
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Natural resource consultant keeps bridge designs environmentally friendly
The Oregon Department of Transportation faced numerous challenges when tasked with repairing or replacing more than 300 bridges within 10 years through the OTIA III State Bridge Delivery Program, a portion of the third phase of the Oregon Transportation Investment Act. Perhaps among the most challenging was to ensure that its work would comply with the environmental permitting requirements of 11 state and federal agencies.
The agency devised a new approach to the time-consuming and complicated environmental permitting process by streamlining the permitting steps into a single set of environmental performance standards that all the regulatory agencies agreed upon. To maximize the likelihood of success using this new process, ODOT turned to the natural resource consulting firm Mason, Bruce & Girard.
Founded in 1921 as a consultant to the forest industry, MB&G established its environmental practice in the 1990s. In the past three years, that practice has expanded 30 percent, largely due to work in transportation and in particular the bridge program.
“MB&G works in the design phase to help engineers understand where sensitive resources are, so their designs can comply with environmental performance standards,” said Bob Carson, MB&G environmental services manager and co-chair of ODOT’s Liaison Committee with the American Council of Engineering Companies. “That way, a project can be permitted quickly via programmatic permitting.”
In 2004, during the beginning phases of the bridge program, MB&G helped to design and establish the new permitting process. Working collaboratively with ODOT and state and federal regulatory agencies, MB&G developed many of the environmental performance standards currently in use by the bridge program. The standards are proactive measures designed to avoid or minimize impacts to the natural environment, and to ensure compliance with regulations that protect federal- and state-listed endangered species, migratory birds, marine mammals, and other fish and wildlife.
Once the permitting process for the bridge program was established, MB&G began partnering with design firms such as Otak Inc., Parsons Brinckerhoff Inc., OBEC Consulting Engineers and H.W. Lochner Inc., as well as Oregon Bridge Delivery Partners, ODOT’s program management firm for the bridge program. MB&G has provided environmental and natural resource support services, and has helped shepherd eight bridge bundles through the new permitting process. The firm also works closely with subcontractors responsible for historical preservation, cultural resources and environmental justice issues.
In addition to state and federal agencies in Oregon, MB&G worked with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality on Bundle 202, I-84: Stanton Blvd.-Snake River, which included repairs to the Snake River Bridge over Interstate 84 on the Oregon-Idaho border. It also partners with every county in which it works, factoring in the county’s unique requirements, some of which are more stringent than those of the Oregon Department of State Lands.
“We are the liaison, to make sure a project is in compliance on everything from water quality to land use,” Carson said. “Our role is proactive and cooperative.”
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