Current Reduction on Big Sioux Spillway Project

Civil Engineering Design

Project Proposal Outline
By: Justin Heyn

Executive Summary
- During the spring months, there have been issues with a spillway flooding and denying passage
into town from the southern side of Castlewood, SD. The culverts that are in place under the
spillway cannot handle the flow rate of the water in the springtime. As well as this problem, the
spillway is slowly sinking deeper into the ground. There have been multiple layers of pavement
laid on top of the spillway, but the culverts never raise with the road. This will eventually cause
the culverts to sink into the riverbed causing them to start filling with sediment, which will in turn
cause the flow rate to reduce even more. The spillway is on 184th street approximately one mile
west of the main road, 459th Ave, through Castlewood. When the spillway floods, it causes all
farm equipment and vehicles south of town to have to go around and come into town through the
North. This damages city roads and causes complications with route plans.
Background
- Before this particular spillway was installed in 1989, there was a wooden bridge in place over the
river. The wooden bridge had to be removed because it was deemed unusable by the county.
Instead of replacing the old wooden bridge with a new state of the art bridge, the county decided
to close the road for good. When this was proposed, everyone living on that side of town past the
spillway put together a petition to have something put over the river to allow access. They got
enough signatures to take to the county and convince officials to put in place a means of
transportation over the river. The county decided to put in a cheap and easy fix. They rushed and
had a spillway put in as fast as they could.
Research
- Measurements
o The spillway is approximately 50 feet long
o The spillway is approximately 40 feet wide
o One culvert is approximately 4 feet wide by 4 feet tall by 40 feet long
o The flow rate is approximately to 51 cubic feet/second
 To put this in perspective, this is approximately to 22,899 gallons/minute
 This is then multiplied by 5 culverts to give the flow rate of the spillway
o The flow rate of the spillway is approximately 114,495
gallons/minute
 *** This is the river flowing at a slower rate than when
the spillway is about to flood
 Flow rate equation
 Q=Av
 Q= Flow rate
  A= Area of Culvert
 v= velocity of liquid
- Assessment of upstream
o At this particular spillway, there are two quick bends to the river before reaching the
spillway. The river flows at a rapid rate during the spring months and after heavy
amounts of rain. The bottom of river upstream has large amounts of soft sediment from
runoff of local fields.

- Current pictures

Figure 1: North Side of Spillway Figure 2: North Side of Spillway Figure 3: South Side of Spillway
3/28/18 3/22/18 3/22/18

Project Plan

- Proposed Solution:

The solution will consist of almost damming the river off to slow down the current. This will
allow the water to keep flowing without backing up the river and causing flooding of local
farmland and even potentially the city of Castlewood. My plan is to have concrete slabs pre-
poured and reinforced with rebar to ensure structural integrity. These slabs will be poured to
certain specifications. The first slab being first in the face of the current will be set lower than the
slabs proceeding it. They will be in a stair-step format when they are all in place. The first slab
will be positioned 5 feet deep past the riverbed with 2 feet challenging the current. The second
slab will be placed 5 feet deep past the riverbed with 4 feet challenging the current. The third slab
will be positioned 5 feet deep past the riverbed with 5 feet challenging the current. All of these
slabs will have a steel piece of angle iron at the top on the face and on the sides of the face to help
in reducing erosion. This will help in ensuring the life of the slabs so they will not need
replacement very often. To reinforce the resistance to the pushing force of the river, steel cables
will be placed off the slab from and eyelet to an eyelet on the shore. There will be foundations for
 the eyelets on shore to keep from pulling out. The foundations of the supports onshore will be
upstream with the foundation being poured at a 45-degree angle facing away from the slabs. This
will ensure the slabs hold their integrity against the current if the bed of the river shifts at all.

- How it will impact problem:

This will aid in solving the problem because the current will hit the slabs and potentially create a
circular motion, which will drastically slow down the current. The current will then circulate to
up and towards the next slab where it will circulate again. The process will repeat to the next slab
and then flow over the third slab heading toward the culverts in the spillway. From the time that
the water flows over the slab and into the culverts, the water will slow down substantially. This
will allow for the spillway to stop overflowing in the spring. Another benefit this project will
have is that it will catch big ice blocks that plug up the culverts and reduce the flow rate even
more.

- Possible complications/problems:

Some possible complications this project might encounter are overflowing, washouts, and
backflow. There is a possibility that the structured slabs will not slow down the current enough if
the current is too strong. This might result in the water by the spillway raising a little bit. This
should not result in the water overflowing at the spillway. Another possible problem that should
be encountered are washouts. With the slabs being directly in the middle of the river, the flow of
the water could end up traveling to the sides of the slabs. This will cause major erosion to the
banks of the river causing a washout at the slabs. To counter this problem, the banks of the river
could be filled with larger rock that will resist the current and will not submit to erosion as much
as the soft bank. A final complication that may result from the slabs is that the river might have
backflow from the obstruction of the slabs. The slabs might slow down the current so much that
the river starts to pool up in front of the slabs. This will directly result in small amounts of
flooding around the slabs.

- Timeline:
The project should take around five months. Once the slabs are made in the early spring, it should
take about a week for them to get to the sight. Meanwhile, there will be a crew working to dam
the river off and divert the water with a cofferdam. This should take anywhere between a month
and a month and a half. Once this is done, the slabs will be put in place along with the foundation
supports on shore, taking about two weeks. Once this is done, the river can be opened up again
and cleaned up. There will need to be a team to fix the disturbed habitats at the end of the project.
- Cost Estimate:
If the concrete slabs were made in Watertown at the Dakota Concrete, they would cost around
$14,300. The cost of the reinforcing rebar that is in the concrete will cost around $5,787. The cost
of shipping them to the spill way would be around $100. The cost of the crane would be around
$500 for 5 hours of work. The cost of renting an excavator would be around $200 for a day of
work. The cost to rent a ground drill would be around $100. With Labor for the five months of
work and other addition costs and permits, the total estimated cost of this project should be
around $100,000.
- Blueprints/drawn plans:

Figure 1: Arial blueprint of project

 Figure 2: Side view blueprint of slabs when placed in river

Figure 3: Face View Blueprint of the largest slab

Figure 4: Face view blueprint of second largest slab

Figure 5: Face view blueprint of third largest slab

Figure 5: Blueprint of foundation support for slabs

Resources/Materials
- Coffer Damming upstream
- Custom Concrete Slabs
o Materials
 Cables, Rebar, Concrete
o Labor
- Equipment
o Cranes
o Excavator
o Concrete trucks
o Ground Drill
Appendices
- Map
o Figure 1: Picture of Castlewood with Big Sioux
o Figure 2: Close up of spill way and Big Sioux

Figure 1: Picture of City of Castlewood and Big Sioux

Figure 2: Picture of spillway and Big Sioux