San Francisco Public Utilities Commission's Water System Improvement Program: Bay Division Pipeline 5 East Bay Reaches Construction Contract Challenges in a Difficult Economy

The San Francisco Bay Area's primary water supply system, highly vulnerable to seismic damage from the nearby San Andreas and Hayward fault zones, consists in part of aging and deteriorated pipelines. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission's (SFPUC) $4.6B Water System Improvement Program (WSIP) consists of 81 projects to improve the seismic and delivery reliability to its customers. The Bay Division Pipeline Reliability Upgrade Project consists of 21 miles of Bay Division Pipeline 5 (BDPL5) from Irvington Portal in Fremont, CA to Pulgas Tunnel Portal in San Mateo County, CA including a five mile tunnel (Bay Tunnel) under the San Francisco Bay. The BDPL5 East Bay Reaches project consists of seven miles of new 72-inch diameter welded steel pipeline constructed within an 80-foot right-of-way, adjacent to existing operating SFPUC Bay Division Pipelines (BDPLs) 1 and 2. The pipeline lies within a growing urban area that continues to develop, with a 2,000 foot section of the pipeline crossing the seismically active Hayward Fault. This paper addresses the early planning, construction challenges, and lessons learned from this project in a very competitive bidding environment.