The Freyssinet Group Expands with the Acquisition of Geopac

The Freyssinet Group, which includes DGI-Menard, recently acquired Geopac, a soil improvement company headquartered in Montreal with a west coast office in Vancouver. Geopac will operate as the Canadian branch of Menard Soltraitement and will work with DGI-Menard to leverage the company's mutual strengths to service the US and the Canadian markets.

DGI-Menard, the US branch of Menard Soltraitement, is part of The Freyssinet Group. In the US the Group also includes The Reinforced Earth Company, specialists in retaining walls and precast concrete structures, and Freyssinet LLC, specialists in prestressing, cable stayed structures and structural repair.

DGI-Menard Installs 94,000+ Prefabricated Vertical Drains for Port Authority Terminal in Alabama

DGI-Menard recently completed one if its largest Prefabricated Vertical Drain (Wick Drain) projects in Mobile, AL for the Alabama State Port Authority's Choctaw Point Terminal. The land reclamation and site stabilization project consisted of the placement of a sand fill behind a driven sheet pile bulkhead wall. Prefabricated Vertical Drain installation was initiated in early January 2006 and was completed in late September 2006.

The drains were installed to depths up to 60 feet through the sand fill and the underlying strata, which consisted of silty sands, clayey sands, and soft clay.

The weight of the sand fill and stress from surface loads will induce significant consolidation of the underlying weak clays. The Prefabricated Vertical Drains serve to reduce the amount of time required for the consolidation settlement to occur and also accelerate the strength gain of the clays as they undergo consolidation. Over 94,000 drains, for a total of about 4.3 million linear feet, were installed. If placed end to end, the drains would extend from Mobile, AL to Chicago, IL!

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Carmin Sbarro Joins DGI-Menard as Project Engineer

Carmin Sbarro has joined the company as a project engineer. She is responsible for sales and engineering support, primarily focused on Controlled Modulus Columns projects. Carmin has a Bachelor's Degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Pittsburgh and is a graduate student in Geotechnical Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh.

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