Kissimmee River Restoration Project

Hill Brothers performed as a major subcontractor on the Kissimmee River Restoration Project, Contract 13A, located in Okeechobee and Highlands Counties, Florida. The purpose of the project was to re-establish approximately ¾ mile of a historic river. The project required the following items of work: building access to the work areas; dredging approximately 92,000 cubic yards of material to re-establish the Historic Kissimmee River oxbows; removal of over 3 million cubic yards dredge spoil; constructing a 4,000-foot gap in the northern end of spoil mound B to allow wetland renourishment within the Kissimmee River Basin; the removal of three existing navigable sheet pile weir structures to allow water flow into the channelized river, which will allow flow into the historic canals low lying areas; refilling approximately two miles of man-made river to allow water flow to return to the historic river and wetland areas. When backfilling on the south end of the project that tied into the existing Kissimmee River, the construction team encountered approximately 20,000 cy of muck from a previous project. This material contained high levels of phosphate. To prevent this contaminated material from entering Lake Okeechobee, HBCC excavated and spread the material to dry it. Once sufficiently dry, it was placed in the fill section on the current river project and covered with additional fill material to prevent erosion. All work was performed with the utmost care to preserve the integrity of the local environment.