CASE STUDY 26 — Southwest Shipyards Barge Construction Building Heavy Industrial Marine Facility | Civil & Structural Engineering

PROJECT OVERVIEW
JRH Engineering provided complete civil and structural engineering design for a large-scale barge construction building on Pelican Island in Galveston, Texas — a facility large enough to build intercoastal barges and launch them directly into the ship channel. The structural challenge was significant: foundations capable of supporting four 60-ton overhead cranes, driven approximately 130 feet deep. JRH resolved the foundation design, integrated rail tracks for side-launch operations, and secured approvals from both the City of Galveston and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

AT A GLANCE

Structural Engineering

● Augur cast pier foundation designed with piers driven approximately 130 feet deep — required to reach bearing capacity below Galveston's soft coastal soils

● Pile caps designed to support four 60-ton overhead cranes — simultaneous crane loading accounted for in the foundation design

● Foundation design was the critical path item: without a resolved structural solution, no other aspect of the project could move forward

Site Civil Design

● Full site civil design for the industrial marine facility including access, grading, and drainage

● Rail tracks integrated into the site design to allow side-launch of completed barges directly into the ship channel — eliminating the need for a separate launch facility

● Site layout designed around the operational sequence: barge construction inside the building, rail transport to the water's edge, side-launch into the channel

Permitting & Agency Coordination

● City of Galveston permit for the building and site improvements

● U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permit for the ship channel interface and marine construction activity

● Both approvals pursued concurrently — marine and building permits coordinated as a single project

THE CHALLENGE
Building a facility capable of constructing and launching full-size intercoastal barges requires solving a structural problem that most engineering firms would find challenging: how do you support four 60-ton overhead cranes simultaneously on Galveston's soft coastal soils? The answer is deep foundation engineering — but the depth required (approximately 130 feet) and the load requirements (240 tons of simultaneous crane capacity) made this a high-stakes structural design challenge on the project's critical path.

JRH's Approach
JRH designed augur cast piers driven to approximately 130 feet — deep enough to reach the bearing stratum below Galveston's compressible coastal soils. Pile caps were engineered for simultaneous crane loading across all four cranes. With the foundation resolved, the site design integrated rail tracks that allowed completed barges to be moved from the construction bay to the ship channel edge and side-launched — a fully operational marine manufacturing and launch sequence in a single facility.

The Result
A fully permitted heavy industrial marine facility capable of building and launching intercoastal barges — with a deep foundation system engineered for 60-ton crane loads and a rail-integrated site design that eliminated the need for a separate launch facility.

RESULTS

● 130-foot deep augur cast pier foundation engineered for four simultaneous 60-ton overhead cranes — critical path structural challenge resolved

● Rail-integrated site design enabled direct barge side-launch into the ship channel — no separate launch facility required

● Dual-agency approval (City of Galveston and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) completed concurrently