**Not **a thread about the politics of the border wall, but, rather, a purely technical/practical thread:
Fisher Sand and Gravel has offered to build a large section of the US-Mexico border wall for just $3.3 billion. From a purely contracting/technical standpoint, does this bid look doable, or is it too low a price to be feasible? Asking Dopers who have experience with contracting and construction.
Here is theirtechnical presentation video
I retired from the State of Confusion, I mean, California, after workjng 20 years in the Department of Transportation. Disclaimer: I am not a licensed civil engineer, nor am I a licensed surveyor. I worked mostly at the “technician” level.
I absorbed a lot, though.
First, you’d need surveyors to go out and FIND the boundary, and then it would have to be marked. Then you’d need a survey of the terrain. Probably some photogrammetry. The geologists would have to figure out what the ground is composed of. A hydrology study would have to be done. Where is the surface water going to go?
Then the data gets turned over to design. How tall is this wall or fence? How deep do the footings need to be? How wide do the footings need to be?
Oh, and don’t forget the Environmental Impact Report! Are you going to disrupt any colonies of Stephens Kangaroo Rats? Any endangered bugs or plants?
There’s a shitload of work that must be done before the first cement truck rolls out! We’re not talking somebody’s backyard fence!
Years. Seriously, years. The EIR alone can bog down and delay a big project by damn near a decade.
Oh, and there are also the public hearings…
There is such an incredible variation of terrain, of geology, of elevation.
Years.
~VOW
Being a contractor is a way of, wait for it, getting contracts. It’s about how you get hired (through contracts between companies rather than between a company and an individual; on the basis of short-term, limited time and scope contracts rather than for a long-term job), not about which kind of job you’re qualified to do.
I’m a contractor. In IT.
If someone hires panache45 (a sculptor specializing in large metallic pieces IIRC) to make a big metallic sculpture reinterpreting their company logo to put in front of headquarters, there panache45 is acting as a contractor.
Neither panache45 nor I are, as far as I know, qualified to evaluate civil engineering projects. Neither is the electrician I contracted to put in my HVAC, mind you, and that one does work in construction.
My guess is that he was using “contractor” to mean “person responsible for management and coordination of a construction site” (see “general contractor”), which is fairly standard usage, at least in American English. Given the background of many (most?) “general contractors”, I think it can be used to describe a person familiar with (if not necessarily expert in) a range of aspect related to construction.
I’m pretty sure environmental impact would be waived for such a project, considering who wants it done. Or maybe I’m just cynical… 
To me, the term “contractor” is misleading. The contractor part of building anything is actually the final stage.
How does the contractor know what to? Building anything isn’t done freestyle or on a whim. The contractor has a fistful of PLANS. And my detailed blah-de-blah-blah explains some of the steps it takes just to get to the plans.
As important as He Who Shall Remain Nameless thinks he is, the steps cannot be skipped or scrimped on. We can probably assume any of the big ass projects with his name on them were created with PLANS.
I’ll grant you, he might think he can sign an “Emergency Executive Order” and waive the EIR. But all the other stuff I mentioned? Mandatory.
Messed up hydrology causing surface water to “get confused” could undermine the wall footings. And if the subsurface geology cannot completely support the weight of the wall, well… I have a picture in my mind of the wall tumbling down like dominoes.
~VOW
It’s only mandatory if you want your structure to remain standing. A recent local story here reported on a bridge on a small rural road failing (as in, deck in the water) the day it opened. Turns out they didn’t do any geotechnical survey before deciding on what sort of pilings would be necessary. So, clearly you can build a bridge without doing a geotechnical survey. It just might not be very useful as a bridge.
The Department of Homeland Security is authorized to waive the National Environmental Policy Act for construction of border fences and walls. Link. This waiver authority has been on the books for more than a decade.
I know nothing useful about civil engineering, but I have dabbled in a little bit of government cost estimating. Just looking at the pictures of what type of structure this company seeks to build, it is far, far, FAR more substantial than the pedestrian barriers that have been built at various parts of the border over the last 15 years. The cost they estimate is just about twice per mile as what it has generally cost to put up bollard style fencing seen in the top picture.
I just can’t see how building something akin to the Great Wall of China is going to cost only twice as much as building a fence. But I can’t speak to the cost drivers for recent fence construction, but I suspect it has a lot to do with the remoteness of the locations. It also isn’t clear to me how the company’s estimate relates to any land acquisition the Government would have to do, which would be included in prior construction costs, but not necessarily in the company’s.
OHGAWD, I didn’t even touch on land acquisition!
Many of my years with the State of Confusion was in Right of Way Engineering. They are the folks who do the mapping of the land needed for the projects. The research, the calculations, the drafting… YEARS.
Then everything goes to Appraisals. The agents there are the ones who conduct business with the land owners, and negotiate the purchase agreements. If no aggreement is reached, THEN the property goes to court to be condemned. This is the “Eminent Domain” business where the government shows the property must be acquired “for the greater good.”
YEARS!
The process must be done with EACH individual owner. You cannot do a blanket condemnation for a swath of land!
~VOW
While I do not dispute that land acquisition could be a very significant problem, I think you are probably making a mistake in extrapolating your experience to the administrative processes for constructing border barriers. Over the period of about two and a half years, DHS built about 600 miles of fences in the late 2000s. That’s because the Federal government is able to waive environmental reviews in a matter of weeks, and after all, constructing a bollard fence is not nearly as challenging as building a road.
I don’t know the current status, but one amusing wall story is that while the Feds can and have used imminent domain to seize property for the border wall, there is a Catholic church (used about once per year for a special celebration) very close to the border that is right in the way. There are special protections given to churches to keep the evil Feds away from those locations. And Trump in particular does not want to hurt his standing with the religious right. But the church is in the way…
Up until recently, they have simply chosen to ignore the problem.
I think that it is universally accepted that the government has the ability to take possession of privately owned land prior to the conclusion of a condemnation proceeding. The right of the landowner (as I understand it) is more or less the right to receive compensation in due course.
I’ll take a WAG and guess the earlier walls were done on easements. And perhaps the Govamint lucked out and great stretches were constructed on land with few owners. Really, that lightens up the mapwork necessary.
But the hydrology and geology work cannot be waived. If some hotshot did everything “quick and dirty,” (like enough to last through a couple of Administrations) there will be the proverbial Hell to pay for the taxpayers…later.
Liability for stuff that falls down. Impaled interlopers who try to crawl over an unstable structure. Misdirected water that prevents crops from being grown, or massive erosion that undermines who knows what? Mosquitoes breeding in brand new swampland, and the little buggers may be carrying the dreaded Zika virus.
I reiterate: this isn’t just a backyard fence. The proposals are for a major construction project.
~VOW
Possession of the land is a BIT more complicated than some suits helicoptering to the approximate border location and saying, “We declare we need this for our wall!”
Read above for survey work, research, negotiations with property owners, and then possibly going to court for condemnation.
The history of this country has been built on an almost sacred connection that citizens have with their LAND. Yes, the Government can and does take the land it needs for the Greater Good. But always, always, it must be done in accordance with the prescribed legal process.
If this process is circumvented there is nothing that will prevent Uncle Sam from busting through your front door and saying, “Get out. I need this now.”
People have a tendency to overvalue any personal possessions. That’s why there are agents well-versed in real estate valuations who negotiate with owners in the acquisition process. It’s only when all negotiations (which must be thoroughly documented) have broken down that the case is taken to court. And sometimes peopke find out the court awards them much less ,money than the appraisers offered.
~VOW
I understand that most of the recent construction has been on Federal land.
Again, your experience with road construction projects is not questioned here. But you’re essentially arguing that it is very difficult to build large sections of barriers on the border for all these administrative, logistical, and liability reasons… and yet we know as a fact that in the late 2000s, many hundreds of miles of border barriers were built within a relatively short period of time.
I’m of the opinion that Trump’s wall is stupid and a major waste of resources, but you can’t seriously expect anyone to believe that building border fencing is nigh impossible when it has in fact been done to a very significant degree within recent memory.
That reality may also speed current construction. We aren’t necessarily starting from scratch on a brand new project. We could be looking at a section of the border that already saw significant preparatory planning before construction on another section was prioritized.
Aha! Federal land!
On Federal land, the Almighty Feds may do whatever they damn well please.
My district in the State of Confusion included several highways that had been constructed when dinosaurs roamed the earth, on BLM land. Or, as it was once was known, GLO land. The State now has ownership (and liability!) for these roads.
I worked in Record Maps my last years, helping people research what the State owned in their neck of the woods. Heh.
When the Feds relinquished the roads to the State, oftentimes there were no deeds, no mapping, no survey notes, nothing. I’m sure there is a mouldering letter in some file (which I did not have) that said essentially, “All yours!”
I got people walking into my office doing research, that must be used in conjunction with their modern day needs. And I didn’t have the information. They would be extremely displeased when I tried to explain WHY I didn’t have it.
I’d say, “The road is, where the road is.” (Meaning the physical road, for all intents and purposes, was floating in space.)
I had design engineers yelling at me, “You MUST have mapping, it is a State road!”
So then I have to go get the Big Boss (with more rank than the unhappy design engineers) to tell them essentially what I had said.
Moral of my story: Federal land is in another dimension of space and time. The Feds can do as they damn well please.
All of my yammering is for privately owned land.
However…(you knew that was coming!) yes, the Feds can mickey-mouse a wall however they want. But if the hydrology, geology, design standards, etc etc etc are not addressed properly, the Feds will be completely liable for the collapsing, misrouted water, impalings, whatnot.
And the taxpayers will pay and pay and pay.
~VOW
How did you not think that a wall would be built on Federal land?
Because there is a helluva lot of privately owned land that borders Mexico.
~VOW
I’m pretty sure that guy was blinking a secret message in Morse Code.