ACEC Illinois Honors HR Green with Two Engineering Excellence Awards
HR Green, Inc. (HR Green) has been honored with two Engineering Excellence Awards for projects in Wood Dale and McHenry. The American Council of Engineering Companies of Illinois (ACEC Illinois) presented the Engineering Excellence Awards at a gala on March 1. The recognition was part of a competition that recognizes projects that demonstrate an exceptional degree of innovation, complexity, achievement, and value.
HR Green received ACEC’s awards in the Transportation category for the IL 19 at Wood Dale Road Intersection Reconstruction project and the Waste and Stormwater category for the McHenry Wastewater Treatment Plants Consolidation Project.
About the HR Green Projects
At the heart of Wood Dale’s city center is a heavily traversed intersection on Wood Dale Road. For decades, this intersection, complicated by the two railroad crossings, has been a source of safety concerns, delays, and driver frustration. HR Green planned and supervised the reconstruction of the intersection and implementation of a new traffic signal controller that allows for two traffic movements regardless of the presence of a train. The controller is a significant innovation and the first in the state of Illinois. The modifications have helped improve safety and reduce driver confusion and congestion.
The City of McHenry chose to consolidate its central and south wastewater treatment plants after discussing viability issues with the Illinois EPA. The central plant had reached the end of its useful life and upgrades would be expensive. HR Green helped evaluate new wastewater treatment technologies that were compact enough to be built on available land. With input from City staff, HR Green designed the upgrade to the south plant with two innovative solutions: a sequencing batch reactor process to handle sludge and BIOACTIFLO™, a high-rate water clarification process. HR Green also provided full-time construction observation and coordinated the wastewater plant start-up procedures.
