Reconstructing Retaining Walls – Day 1
Posted on August 8th, 2016 by John FoegleyRetaining walls built from pressure treated timbers 30+ years ago are beginning to fail.
Back in the 1980’s and 1990’s pressure treated timbers were believed to be a great material for building retaining walls. Unfortunately, wood decays, sometimes ants destroy it and gravity always takes it’s toll.
It’s just mother natures way. These 8′ tall retaining walls have failed and will need to be reconstructed. They’ll be replaced with modern modular blocks produced by Allen Block because they are beautiful, stronger and won’t decay like the timbers.
Retaining wall reconstruction begins with removing the walls and overgrown plant material. The Foegley team used our new excavator and the grapple bucket on the skid steer to complete this phase quickly and efficiently.
The walls will be reinforced with 6′ layers of geogrid, drainage gravel and compacted backfill, so they won’t be easy to construct. After excavation, our crews will start laying base and block. We’ll show you that process in our next post.