Kelly Creek Culvert Replacement

Kane Drive is a vital, five-lane thoroughfare that averages more than 35,000 daily trips and serves as a major freight corridor, a TriMet public transportation route, and access for students at the adjacent Mt. Hood Community College. The closure prompted an Emergency Disaster declaration from Gresham city leaders to expedite repairs and the reopening of the road to traffic.

ESA was part of a multidisciplinary team that assisted the City of Gresham in developing an emergency temporary response to reopen this critical section of roadway, and then to design, permit, and construct a permanent culvert replacement that met all environmental and roadway standards.

After meeting with City mayoral and Public Works staff, the ESA design team determined that a temporary replacement culvert was needed to reopen the road as soon as possible. Within a week, ESA initiated an on-site environmental coordination meeting with environmental staff from the Oregon Department of Transportation, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, National Marine Fisheries Service, Department of State Lands, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, and the City to discuss the temporary replacement culvert design.

ESA staff coordinated local land use approvals, submitted environmental permit applications, and participated in daily call-in meetings with the City, contractor, and design team. The temporary culvert was installed and the roadway reopened to traffic less than one month after ESA received its notice-to-proceed.

Following the construction of the emergency temporary culvert replacement, we were on the design, permitting, and construction support services team for the installation of a permanent culvert replacement. We conducted the fish passage analyses to inform the culvert and streambed design, delineated wetlands and stream ordinary high water, and performed historic and archeological resource assessments.

ESA also led the environmental documentation and permitting efforts, including securing a USACE Section 404 permit, a DSL Removal-Fill permit, a DEQ 401 WQ Certification, and an ODFW Fish Passage Plan Approval. Because of the federal funding and ODOT oversight of the project, ESA prepared environmental documentation in accordance with ODOT/FHWA requirements, including meeting Federal Aid Highway Programmatic Biological Opinion criteria to satisfy Endangered Species Act consultation requirements.

ESA also performed fish salvage prior to in-water work, conducted environmental inspections during construction, and prepared post-project environmental permitting report submittals following the September 2018 completion of construction.