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ACEC Honor Award 2003

East Grand Forks Levees Project, Phase I
East Grand Forks, Minnesota

The devastating flood of 1997 caused physical damages of nearly $1 billion and challenged the psychological fortitude of a community plagued by flooding rivers. SEH’s Phase I Levee Project was the first of a five-phase project designed to provide unparalleled flood protection, enhance community recreational features, and prevent revised flood insurance boundaries from crippling the City of East Grand Fork’s economy.

This project significantly changed the outcome of a planned FEMA study looking to revise the City’s flood insurance boundaries. If the boundaries were revised before the project was complete, almost the entire city would have been included in the flood hazard area, requiring residents and business owners to shell out millions of dollars for flood insurance. Furthermore, no new development could occur within the flood hazard area.

With the study set to begin in 2004, SEH fast tracked the project’s design. More than 1,000 pages of specifications and 283 sheets of drawings were prepared within eight months. SEH saved design time and money by replicating the design of four of the five pump stations with the same footprint, dimensions, pump bays and electrical and mechanical facilities so only one set of drawings was required. With the downtown area now protected from flooding, East Grand Forks has attracted businesses such as Cabela’s; and the City’s population is rising.

Attention to aesthetics and creating recreational opportunities around and on the levees keeps residents from feeling barricaded by a fortress. Pump stations blend with their neighborhoods. Stone or simulated stone masonry faces soften concrete flood walls and stoplog closure structures. Trailheads provide a gathering place for the community and entice pedestrians and bikers to enjoy the new trails constructed on or adjacent to the levees.

This $21 million project, completed in October 2003, provides protection for a flood even greater than the 1997 event. It was chosen as the first of five phases because of its importance to the amount of area and number of residences and businesses it protected.