EXPEDITED DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF THE BURLINGTON NORTHERN SEATTLE INTERNATIONAL GATEWAY

On July 1, 1985, Burlington Northern (BN) Railroad Company completed construction of a new container-handling facility at Seattle, Washington. The new facility, dubbed the Seattle International Gateway, had been built in just 6 months, to meet market demands for double-stack railroad equipment and potential growth in the Pacific Northwest. This feat could not have been accomplished without extensive planning, the innovative use of equipment, and the personal commitment of everyone involved. Planning and scheduling began before the project reached the drawing boards and continued throughout the course of construction. Design engineers and construction contractors scheduled their work using the critical path method and continually updated their schedules as conditions changed. Modern, high-production equipment was used to expedite both the design and the construction. Equipment included electronic survey instrumentation, a new device to measure subgrade strength, and high-production concrete batch plants and finishing machines. The end result was an efficient, low-cost, container-handling facility, located within 1 mi of the Port of Seattle and BN's main-line railroad, which offers substantial savings to shippers using stack train service to Chicago and has made the Port of Seattle more competitive in international markets.

• Record URL:
  • http://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/state-of-the-art/4/4-007.pdf
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/08926891
• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper appeared in Transportation Research Board State-of-the-Art Report 4, Facing the Challenge, The Intermodal Terminal of the Future, Conference on Intermodal Freight Terminal Design, New Orleans, Louisiana, March 2-5, 1986. Distribution, posting, or copying of this PDF is strictly prohibited without written permission of the Transportation Research Board of the National Academy of Sciences. Unless otherwise indicated, all materials in this PDF are copyrighted by the National Academy of Sciences. Copyright © National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • McCarthy, W T
• Conference:
  • Facing the Challenge. The Intermodal Terminal of the Future
  • Location: New Orleans, Louisiana
  • Date: 1986-3-2 to 1986-3-5
• Publication Date: 1986

Media Info

• Features: Figures; Tables;
• Pagination: p. 41-47
• Serial:
  • State-of-the-Art Report
  • Issue Number: 4
  • Publisher: Transportation Research Board
  • ISSN: 0892-6891

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Conferences; Construction; Construction equipment; Construction scheduling; Container cars; Critical path method; Design; Doublestack service; Freight terminals; Planning; Railroad cars by type
• Uncontrolled Terms: Double stack container cars
• Subject Areas: Bridges and other structures; Construction; Design; Freight Transportation; Highways; Pavements; Planning and Forecasting; I21: Planning of Transport Infrastructure;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00472289
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS, TRB
• Created Date: Jul 31 1987 12:00AM