Renovation Nearing Completion At Colorado State; Flood Control Efforts Leave Buildings Resistant To '100-Year' Deluges
Thursday, July 16, 1998
FORT COLLINS--Many of the buildings on the Colorado State
University campus hit hard by the flood of July 28, 1997, can or
soon will be able to withstand a similar deluge with only minimal
damage.
With these improvements, most buildings would also escape
unscathed the effects of a so-called 100-year flood.
Campus officials combined a policy of containment with one
of cost-effectiveness, said Ronald Baker, director of facilities
management at Colorado State. Berms, low walls, reconfigured
stairwells, raised vents, waterproofed utility vaults and similar
fixes wouldn't be noticed by an unfamiliar eye, but will protect
high-priority buildings at risk of flooding.
While the campus could be floodproofed, Baker said, such a
move would be neither cost effective nor practical.
"There is no reasonable way to protect completely against
such floods," Baker said. "Instead, we took a look at protecting
crucial buildings.
"Given current efforts, we are planning to have zero damage
for a 100-year flood, and we've tried to protect most others
against an event like last year's flood, including the Education
Building, Eddy Hall, the Heating Plant, Lory Student Center,
Morgan Library and the Hartshorn Health Center.
"Should a flood like the one in 1997 recur, what we'd have
is $3-4 million in damage instead of more than $100 million."
For example, Baker said, a low wall was built on the west
side of the library where water entered the building last summer.
An entrance on the building's north side and an electrical vault
have been restructured to keep water from entering, and
staircases were reconfigured to keep water out.
The work "looks pretty good, to be honest," Baker said. "If
we had an event like last summer's at the Morgan Library, we
wouldn't have any damage."
Building repairs are done or nearing completion. At Morgan
Library, for example, only a section of basement used until
recently for processing donated books still needs renovation.
Similarly, reconstruction work has been completed on the
College Avenue Gym, Forestry Building, Heating Plant, Johnson
Hall, the Music Building, Spruce Hall, the Administration Annex
and Centers for Disease Control (on the Foothills Campus). Work
on Eddy Hall, the Education Building and Hartshorn Health
Services will be completed in August; Gibbons Hall will be
finished in October; and the finishing touches should be done on
Lory Student Center later this fall.
Flood mitigation efforts to the Occupational Therapy
building are finished, but routine renovation of mechanical
systems still is ongoing. In several cases, Baker said, work
crews minimized disruption by carrying out scheduled maintenance
while repairing flood damage.
With work done or nearing completion, planners have raised
their sights should another flood occur. Along with what Baker
terms "local mitigation projects" - the work on individual
buildings - storm sewers have been cleaned and steam tunnel vents
will be raised. Planning has started on efforts that would
impound water on open areas of the campus until it can be safely
dispersed. Funding permitting, Baker expects to complete these
projects no later than the summer of 2001.
While every building has been repaired, not every one has
been scheduled for floodproofing. Protecting some buildings on
the east side of the Oval, for example, would simply be too
expensive, and such efforts would interfere with the area's
aesthetic charm.
"It always ends up as a cost-benefit kind of decision,"
Baker said. "The plan that we have, for a reasonable amount of
money, will eliminate nearly all of the damages we could expect
from another storm like last year's."
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