Blasting for a private homeowner’s garage project will resume Jan. 6 in the side of a mountain above Ouray, with operations paused for the upcoming Ouray Ice Festival due to safety concerns.
The project has been delayed for more than seven months, after complaints from the public in April prompted the county to order the construction to stop.
Ouray residents complained about the blasting last spring, after they were surprised by explosions coming from 400 Queen St. The blasting happened without required public notification, regulated by the state, and alarmed residents who heard and felt the blast, and saw plumes of dust rising from the property located near the Perimeter Trail.
This photo shows the first blast completed at the 400 Queen St. project, which happened April 18 without proper public notice. Neighbors were alarmed when the explosion happened and complained to officials. The blasting contractor was fined $500 for lack of proper notification.
After outcry about the blasting, the county issued stop-work orders and cracked down on building permit requirements for the project, something contractors said they had never encountered before.
Further blasting was delayed until the parties reached a county-approved blasting plan, with blasting occurring Monday through Thursday from Jan. 6 through Feb. 13.
Blasting will pause from Jan. 20–23, and Jan. 27–30 to account for the Ouray Ice Festival. The county is now finalizing building and right-of-way encroachment permits, and lifting two stop work orders issued over the summer.
The contractors were ready to begin work again earlier in the month but were stopped due to a missing county right-of-way encroachment permit application. At that point, the contractors had fulfilled every other requirement including a full geotechnical review.
But while addressing that final term of the agreements put forth by the county, the contractors and county also responded to new concerns over impacts to the Ouray Ice Park and the upcoming ice climbing festival. The park is located with the Uncompahgre Gorge, roughly 1,300 feet from the blasting site. It opened on Dec. 21.
A new geotechnical analysis focusing on risks to the park and a third-party review from the Colorado Geological Survey were considered with an initial geotechnical analysis and other documents to determine blasting would not likely have an impact to the park or nearby structures.
The dispute
The disagreement between the county and property owner Jonathan Waite and his contractors stems from complaints over the blasting and the county’s attempt to regulate the project.
Ouray County does not have any local blasting regulations, though last summer commissioners said they would like to see the county create those regulations. Instead, blasting is regulated by the State Explosives Program operated by the Colorado Division of Oil & Public Safety.
But the county issued two stop-work orders for the project over the summer and crafted a list of requirements as part of issuing a building permit for the project, which the contractors agreed to fulfill to get the project back on track.
Geotechnical studies and the ice park
One of the key requirements was a full geotechnical study examining if blasting is safe in this area, including seismic analysis requirements, rockfall and other hazard areas, impact on fault lines and other necessary safety measures.
Grand Junction-based Goodrich Engineering LLC completed that preliminary assessment which found the size of recorded blasts and the sound generated to be in line with state regulations.
After the state fined contractors for failure to notify residents of blasting in April, the state monitored the operations. The study also said there was no impact on nearby faults and slim risk of rockfall initiated by blasting. It also found that tunnels or similar underground structures, such as a garage structure, are safe places to be when rockfall is initiated during earthquakes.
But after the contractors hit a delay in resuming work in December, the county requested that Goodrich Engineering update their report to address concerns brought forth by the Ouray Ice Park, which it did.
After reviewing the Goodrich analysis, Laurie Brandt, a geologist with Montrose-based Buckhorn Engineering Inc., sent an email to the county expressing concerns that the Goodrich analysis did not specifically address impacts to ice and snow.
Brandt said that if injury or ice fall were to occur, there would be no way to prove it wasn’t due to blasting activity.
She recommended that the county send the analysis to the Colorado Geological Survey for an outside review.
Jonathan R. Lovekin, a senior engineering geologist with CGS, responded to that request on Dec. 16 and said he had “no objection to the project or its methods,” but advised no blasting should be allowed during the festival.
“If blasting impacts the ice structures, this will give them time to ‘heal,’ ” Lovekin wrote.
“This is an essential difference between rock and ice. If there are cracks in the ice, a little time allows water to fill the cracks or settlement to close them. Both processes would increase the strength of the structure.”
Their review also recommended that any blasting in the weeks before the festival require a seismograph and spotter at the Ouray Ice Park, supplied by the contractor.
On Dec. 20, a second geotechnical analysis from Grand-Junction based Capstone West completed for the project’s blasting contractor also found that no damage to the Ouray Ice Park would result from blasting vibrations.
The county cited the CGS review, additional Capstone West geotechnical study and a letter from the Ouray Ice Park board of directors in its announcement the project would be allowed to resume blasting.
Each home within a 500-foot radius of the construction work will be provided notice of the blasting schedule and contractors will notify the county building inspector and emergency manager by 10 a.m. if blasting is planned for that day. The county will follow up with electronic, public notifications of daily blasting.
