Civil Engineering and Site Design

THE PROJECT
This project for the Village of Royal Palm Beach in Florida aimed to provide space for residents to store recreational vehicles and prefabricated structures such as mobile homes and boats.

As part of our continuing contract to provide engineering services to the village, Erdman Anthony provided site planning, traffic engineering, civil engineering, permitting, preparation of plans and specifications, and land surveying. The team included subconsultants for landscape architecture and electrical engineering.

FEATURES/SOLUTIONS
The project involved:

• Two concrete parking lots, with spaces 25 or 40 feet long 
• Establishing landscape screening around the parking lots
• Adding a water service line for residents to use to wash their vehicles in a wash area.
• A sewerage dump station for emptying storage tanks, near the wash area
• Security measures including fencing, card-controlled access gates, lighting, and cameras
• A drainage system to discharge to a dry detention pond that was built on village-owned land under the FPL transmission lines
• Providing limited construction-phase services to assist the village’s engineering staff with responding to RFIs and reviewing shop drawings

IMPACTS
The village does not allow these sorts of large vehicles and prefabricated structures to be stored in the driveways, so residents now have a safe, convenient, and affordable solution.

In addition, given that the village owned land under a Florida Power & Light (FPL) easement, it made good use of that vacant and underutilized property.

Sustainable Design Impact These important coastal water control structures allow the District to manage the surface waters of Palm Beach County addressing water quality, flood control, and water supply for the region.  The concrete surface is not only durable, but the white surface of the pavement also helps to reduce the heat island effect that is associated with darker asphalt pavements. The surface water management system for the site includes a large dry detention pond that will address not only flood control but also provide water quality treatment for the site by detaining the runoff where nitrogen, phosphorous and other nutrients are removed in the grassed detention pond and where suspended solids are allowed to settle. The project pavement and detention pond were constructed underneath existing high voltage power lines.  The suitability of that location is limited as no structures or open waterways can be constructed in the power line easement.  Therefore, the project is an effective and sustainable use for that location.