Two Veterans' Clinics Gain Additional Space with CULTEC's Underground Stormwater Chambers
BROOKFIELD, CT/April 2, 2009 - The James A. Haley Veterans' (VA) Hospital in Tampa, Fla., is one of the largest and busiest VA facilities in the U.S. To help ease the patient traffic, several VA clinics are being developed in the vicinity of the Hospital to serve as its outpatient services satellites. Among them are a medical center on 46th Street and the Bruce B. Downs VA clinic.
When it came to designing stormwater systems for the two clinics, owner and developer Knut Horneland was faced with a challenge of space constraints. Drainage ponds, commonly used in Tampa, take up valuable space. Horneland opted for underground stormwater systems, which he had successfully used before. He selected CULTEC Recharger® models for both developments due to their cost-effectiveness.
"As we have so little space available for development in Tampa, we need to use land creatively and efficiently," said Horneland. "CULTEC underground systems freed up areas that otherwise would have been occupied by stormwater ponds. CULTEC products also proved to be very cost-efficient and allowed the projects to achieve substantial cost-savings."
According to Horneland, the CULTEC system on 46th Street allowed him to save about 15 percent off the installation costs, and the Bruce B. Downs' installation savings were about 20 percent, compared to the costs of precast and corrugated pipe systems.
The Bruce B. Downs VA clinic is located on three acres and includes a 16,244 sq. ft. pharmacy and an 18,000 sq. ft. oncology building with a vault for radiological treatment. To gain additional space, the developer placed the oncology clinic in the area previously occupied by a stormwater pond.
The new ½-acre lot designated for the stormwater system had some loose soil areas, so the vibratory compaction process was used to compress the earth, lowering the surface by about a foot.
To meet the project's 60,500 cu. ft. storage requirement, the CULTEC staff designed a two-tier retention system, which required 853 Recharger 280 HD units and 2,900 tons of backfill stone.
Situated on a two-acre plot, the medical center on 46th Street includes an 11,560 sq. ft. Audiology Center and another 13,840 sq. ft. facility. To address the clinic's storage needs of 30,000 cu. ft., CULTEC designed a retention system using the Recharger V8 chamber, providing in excess of 50,000 cu. ft. of storage. More than 450 Recharger V8 units were installed in a half-acre, single-tier bed and backfilled with 3,200 tons of stone.
CULTEC's Recharger products are high-profile, high-capacity plastic chambers designed for underground stormwater detention and retention. They are specifically designed for use in traffic applications, meet the strictest industry requirements, including IAPMO R&T certification, and are backed by a 10-year warranty. For more information about CULTEC and its products, visit www.cultec.com.
CULTEC, Inc., headquartered in Brookfield, Conn., is a national manufacturer of plastic chambers used in subsurface retention/detention stormwater management and septic applications. The company currently provides the largest selection of chamber types and sizes of any chamber manufacturer. It also designed its own manifold and water quality systems to complement its product line, which has an established history on the market dating back to 1986. Recharger® and Contactor® models meet HS-25 wheel load requirements and are included in HydroCAD, BOSS International's StormNET and Streamline Technologies' ICPR modeling software. CULTEC offers a complete stormwater management plan to help engineers and their clients meet Phase II regulations of the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Water Act. In addition, CULTEC products can contribute to the U.S. Green Building Council's credits, under the LEED rating system, when the project is designed per LEED requirements.
