Overcoming Structural Design Challenges for Train Unloading Station at Coal Terminal in Colombia

This paper presents a summary of structural design challenges experienced, and resolved, during the construction of a train unloading station (TUS) at a key coal export terminal in Colombia. The TUS is a U-shaped underground cast-in-place concrete box structure, with a base slab and sidewalls supporting a series of transverse rail support girders. Due to unforeseen design changes and discoveries during construction, the original design of the TUS was deemed structurally inadequate to resist extremely high buoyant and hydrostatic design loads. By the time, these critical design changes were realized, the construction of the TUS was about 50% complete. To retrofit the partially built TUS structure, a simplified design method was developed utilizing materials which were locally available and implementing a simple solution which could be successfully executed with less expertise. The retrofit measures were successfully implemented, and the construction of the TUS was completed on time. The train unloading station continues to operate successfully.