BOBCAT COMPACT EQUIPMENT DELIVERS THE RIGHT SIZE, POWER AND SPEED TO THE PORT OF MIAMI TUNNEL PROJECT, TO ALLEVIATE CONGESTION AND ALLOW FOR MORE GROWTH
Nearly 16,000 vehicles travel through the Port of Miami daily, clogging downtown streets, creating safety hazards and restricting the port’s growth. With little land available above ground to expand roadways and bridge structures, the Port of Miami tunnel project will help relieve some of the congestion with the construction of twin tunnels. The total construction costs are estimated to be $607 million.
“Constrained space is the primary challenge for this project,” says Moneiba Hernandez, surface superintendent, Bouygues Civil Works Florida, the design-build contractor for this project. Providing compact equipment — including attachments — for support functions inside the tunnel boring machine and around the equally tight jobsite on shore, a Bobcat®
and nine 4x4 3400XL utility vehicles work in tandem on the 24/7 operation. The Bobcat machines and attachments were acquired from the local dealership, Bobcat of Metro Dade, in Hialeah Gardens, Fla.
Work began in 2010 and currently Bouygues Civil Works Florida is excavating under the ocean fl oor with a massive tunnel boring machine, manufactured in Germany and shipped to Florida, consisting of a four-story cutter head mounted on a body longer than a football fi eld. It cuts a path between 23 to 43 feet a day, making way for the placement of a series of precast concrete segments.
These concrete walls form the rings of a 42-foot diameter tube that — when completed in 2014 — will contain two traffi c