Stage of Construction: Excavation

Contact: Dave Dryden, DC Dryden LLC, Project Manager 

Type of Construction: Worship and Classroom Spaces, New Construction, Both Public and Private Work

Weather: Very Cold, Windy and Wet.

On the day I arrived, there were some construction guys hanging around who weren’t able to do any work that day because it was too wet to dig. They started the project on November 1st, which is pretty late in the year to begin digging because the ground is wet and freezes easily.

The project includes a church, parking space, A retention pond for storm runoff, a public road and bridge that is being privately performed and then handed over to the city and a private road for access to the church. There is also a parcel of land that is for sale that is to be improved as part of the project.

This project was bid on in the traditional design-bid-build method. Thompson Excavation was doing the excavation work and on site they had quite a bit of equipment. Mr. Dryden told me that they own most of their own equipment. I spoke briefly to the foreman in charge of excavation and he seemed discouraged that they hadn’t been able to get much work done lately because the mud was sticking to everything and they were spinning their wheels.

On site I observed lots of types of equipment, a mailbox, a porta john and a large pile of fill dirt at the back of the site. I mention the mailbox because it seemed odd to me that there was a mailbox on a site that was just dirt. Mr. Dryden told me that it is required by code that you maintain a mailbox at the construction site in that locality. Additionally, there was a small parking area for the equipment that has been stoned with rocks the size of my fist. 

Something Interesting about this site is that they were waiting on an arborist to come in from the city before they could start clearing brush and trees for the road/site/bridge because the city of Canal Winchester is what is called a “tree city” meaning they have algorithms that determine (based on tree caliper-trunk size- and species) how many trees you have to plant on the site for each tree you tear down. This then equates to a certain amount of green space you must have in the final scheme.