East Park Regional Industrial Park

Location: Boyd County, Kentucky

Geotechnical Consultant: Wayne Karem

Boyd, Carter, Elliott, Greenup, and Lawrence counties joined
together to develop a regional industrial park. The regional
industrial park is located on property owned by Addington
Resources and consists of two tracts: Site A with 240 acres and
Site B with 575 acres. Both sites were extensively strip mined by 1980's. Ridge-top removal and contour bench mining were the primary methods with the spoil back-stacked on the mine bench. Several large hollow fills were constructed as part of the previous mining activities. The rock overburden consists of interbedded layers of shale, siltstone, sandstone, coal, and underclays. Fill depth typically ranged from 40 to 70 feet over the strip bench areas. The site was further complicated by the numerous buried highwalls.

Dr. Karem, while at another firm was retained to perform a
geotechnical exploration as part of an overall site feasibility study for
developing the sites into a regional industrial park. Dr. Karem and his
team developed a model of the subsurface conditions using
exploration data and mapping. Dr. Karem worked with the site civil
consultant to maximize the number of industrial lots while reducing
the potential for costly site remediation and/or high risk of excessive
settlement. The recommendations included designating areas
where the subsurface conditions favored heavy manufacturing
facilities and where conditions favored more lightly loaded, flexible structures.

We specifically addressed site preparation and site feasibility issues such as:

• Settlement of the mine spoil
• Future degradation of the shale portion of the fill
• Slope stability concerns
• Pavement performance on the shale subgrade
• Utility construction, location, and maintenance
• Site remediation techniques for higher risk areas