Replacing and Relocating a Hampton Force Main for Community Benefit

With more than 150 years of history, Hampton University is a premier educational institute and a Historically Black College and University in southeast Virginia. To allow the university to utilize its campus in new ways and provide reliability improvements, an existing 30-inch force main needed to be replaced and relocated away from Hampton University’s property. For this Hampton Roads Sanitation District sewer extension and relocation project, Kimley-Horn provided the following services:

• Preliminary engineering report preparation
• Pipeline design
• Trenchless technology design
• Traffic engineering
• Construction phase services
• Easement acquisition tracking

Overcoming Constraints with Collaboration

Kimley-Horn thoughtfully collaborated with a variety of stakeholders to navigate construction and scheduling constraints for the force main replacement. Our team worked with Hampton University, Newport News Waterworks, the City of Hampton, the Virginia Department of Transportation, and other partners, coordinating based on unique needs in the project’s various locations.

For instance, we navigated around campus restrictions on construction during the school year, tourism-driven summertime roadway construction concerns, and other seasonal limitations. Design efforts required establishing a detailed sequence of construction to accommodate all restrictions for new construction activities, starting up new facilities, and removing the old force main to meet all stakeholder requirements.

Leveraging Trenchless Technology & Coordination in a Complex Area

For the force main replacement and relocation, our team used a variety of different pipeline sizes and lengths—installed via trenchless and open cut methods. Using ductile iron and high-density polyethylene, we designed:

• 1,600 linear feet (LF) of 30-inch force main
• 7,400 LF of 24-inch force main
• 200 LF of 16-inch force main
• 2,100 LF of 12-inch force main
• 2,000 LF of 10-inch force main
• 600 LF of 4-inch force main
• 1,200 LF of 2-inch through 20-inch water main (relocation)

The new force main alignment also included 1,600 LF of pipeline installed by horizontal directional drilling (HDD) across the Hampton River.  HDD was utilized to minimize environmental impacts to this sensitive tributary—which connects to the James River and Chesapeake Bay. Staging for the drill also encompassed a community park, requiring careful coordination to avoid heavy spring and summertime park use.

Additionally, our team worked to maintain traffic flow by collaborating with right-of-way administrators and coordinating detours when needed. This traffic engineering helped the urban area around the college, interstate highway, downtown offices, and local neighborhoods stay up-and-running during the construction period.

The transmission main was finished in 2024, and the project is anticipated to be finalized in the summer of 2026—aligning with the university’s academic schedule. When completed, the sewer extension and relocation project will open a pathway for further Hampton University development and support enhanced wastewater infrastructure for the greater Hampton area.