Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus engaged LeChase Construction Services, LLC to design and build a new parking garage on Ellicott Street, bounded by Goodrich Street to the south and North Street to the north. McMahon & Mann was retained to collect and review soils information at the site and provide foundation recommendations. McMahon & Mann was also involved with construction monitoring, excavation support system recommendations, and stormwater retention system design.

We completed bearing capacity and settlement estimates using the SPT data from the borings. We also developed a cone penetration testing (CPT) program that included advancing the CPT probe along the proposed foundation column lines. We recommended supporting the entire new garage with strip footings beneath each of the column lines.

We estimated foundation settlement using the column loads, footing dimensions and foundation bearing pressures provided. We observed the condition of the foundation bearing grades as they were exposed to estimate their suitability to support the building loads. This included observing proof rolling the bearing grade to estimate the subgrade stiffness and suitability. If unsuitable soil was observed at the foundation-bearing grade elevation, we recommended drainage or over excavation techniques.