News
Mark Mickelson, PE of Yaggy Colby Associates'
Delafield office will present “Genesee Lakes Outlet Pipe Designed to Stop
Flooding” at the Wisconsin Association for Floodplain, Stormwater, and Coastal
Management’s (WAFSCM) Annual Meeting. Mark will be the speaker for Session C1
at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, 11/3. The conference is being held in Pewaukee, WI
at the Country Springs Hotel. For more information on this innovative design
solution, please click here.
Congratulations to our clients, the City of Lewiston,
MN and the City of Goodview, MN, on receiving a Safe Routes to School grant.
Yaggy Colby Associates assisted these communities with their successful Safe Routes
to School applications, representing two of only 16 awards statewide. The Safe Routes
to School program stems from the Federal Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient
Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users Act (SAFETEA-LU). The goals of the
program are to encourage children of all abilities to walk or bike to school, to make
walking and bicycling to school safer, to improve the health of youth through an active
lifestyle, and to reduce traffic, fuel consumption, and air pollution.
Yaggy Colby Associates has extensive experience with Safe Routes to School Programs
including training, planning, grant applications, design, and grant administration.
Our engineers and planners are specialized in pedestrian/bicycle facility design, traffic
management, and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which are all key components to
creating an active, safe, and pedestrian/bicycle friendly community.
Yaggy Colby Associates would like to take this opportunity to recognize
the Rochester Community and Technical College and the Mayo Clinic, two of the 2010 Olmsted County
Environmental Achievement Award winners. Yaggy Colby Associates is proud to have assisted both of
these organizations on their projects.
To reduce stormwater runoff volumes and pollution from parking areas, RCTC designed and constructed an “Eco-Lot” in their parking lot
expansion on the west side of their facilities. The Eco-Lot accommodates all of their stormwater on site with features that include
bioswales, rain gardens, infiltration basins, and native landscaping. The lot is also pedestrian friendly and contains signage that
educates students and visitors about the need to manage stormwater runoff and the benefits of the various design features utilized in the Eco-Lot.
Yaggy Colby Associates served as the owner’s representative during construction and provided landscape architectural services for some site landscape redesign.
In 2010 Mayo clinic installed the largest solar array (462 panels, rated at 145 kW) in Southeastern Minnesota on their Damon Parking garage. On a sunny day, at peak output, the panels provide all the power required for the Damon Ramp (lighting, elevators, heating and cooling of stairwells) and feed excess energy into the electrical grid. In addition to the solar project, three raingardens were constructed to capture and naturally filter water running off of their lawns and parking lots. The attractive and functional raingardens are located in three separate locations on the Mayo Medical Campus providing and each demonstrates for employees and visitors. Yaggy Colby Associates provided the planning, and design for the three raingardens.
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will soon be announcing the availability of Federal grant and loan funds of $200,000 - $1,000,000 per award for the environmental assessment and cleanup of brownfield sites. These EPA brownfield grants are available to cities, counties, local government entities, and Indian tribes. Their purpose is to help facilitate environmental planning, assessment, and cleanup activities at brownfield sites that communities seek to acquire, redevelop and reinvigorate through enhanced economic development, the creation of greenspace, or to facilitate public use of value.
As the EPA brownfield grant process is competitive, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is partnering with the Federal EPA and the Nebraska Dept. of Environmental Quality (NDEQ) to host two grant application workshops to help Iowa entities that seek to learn more about these grant opportunities, the application process, and ‘tips and tricks’ to make grant applications more competitive. Workshops will be held from 8:30am – 4:30pm on the following dates and locations: Wednesday, August 31 in Omaha, Nebraska; or Thursday, September 8th, in Coralville, Iowa.
Attending workshops like these is one way Yaggy Colby Associates stays abreast of available grants and other funding sources. On behalf of our clients, our staff continually searches for new funding sources.
A groundbreaking ceremony was held on August 11 for the UWM Accelerator Building, the first project planned for the Innovation Park development located in the City of Wauwatosa, WI. Representatives from UWM, the City of Wauwatosa, City of Milwaukee, Milwaukee County, and State of Wisconsin were in attendance. Yaggy Colby Associates is pleased to be providing design and construction services for this significant project, which is partially funded by a $5.4m EDA grant.
YCA’s most recent Wisconsin DNR grant submittals were awarded funds! The Village of Lac La Belle was awarded two Lake Protection grants, and the Village of Summit was awarded a Lake Protection grant for Shoreland Ordinance Development/Update. Contact Mike Court at 262-646-6855 or mikec@yaggy.com to discuss these grants, or to find out additional grant opportunities available through our MN and IA offices.
As requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) change, Yaggy Colby Associates makes sure it keeps up-to-date with proposed new requirements. With this goal, a group of designers recently attended MnDOT-sponsored training to see how MnDOT plans to effect better compliance. This training helps reinforce the intent of the ADA requirements, as well as the real-life challenges faced during construction. The knowledge gained will help us provide our clients with improved designs and ensure adequate facilities for the traveling public.
The ribbon cutting ceremony for the “Grand Reopening” of the Lake Country Trail in Waukesha County, Wisconsin was held on June 4 at the Landsberg Building on the east end of the trail in Pewaukee, WI. The ceremony celebrated paving work performed last year, which transformed a large portion of the 13-mile trail from gravel to asphalt. These paving improvements both open the trail to additional recreational users and extend trail use to year-round. The final segment of the trail, between Golf Road and Glen Cove Road, is being completed this summer.
Yaggy Colby Associates is proud to have provided construction management for this 2010 WisDOT construction project, which involved reconstruction and paving of 7 miles of the trail. The Lake Country Trail is an asset for the county, offering an alternative transportation linkage as well as healthy recreation opportunities.