Thursday, September 02, 2021

That Good Virginia Clay, and Ida

 Along Reston Parkway near Town Center there's a project underway, trying to squeeze in a turn lane between the existing roadway and the buildings.  For some reason instead of just putting in a roadbed maybe 12 inches thick, they've been excavating several feet down, perhaps to run some utility pipeline or something. 

They had a small road roller, maybe 4 wide, sitting in the excavation on Tuesday. I drove past it today--the good red Virginia clay at the bottom and sides of the excavation was holding the water Ida dropped when she passed by. The water was up to the axle of the roller, likely 15 inches or so. I'm impressed by the ability of the clay soil to hold the water

At our plot in the community garden about 1.2 mile south of there our rain gauge showed 4 inches falling between Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning, most during a thunder storm which I heard and went back to sleep again.   This year National Airport has been wetter than average while Dulles has been several inches below average. Ida dropped more rain on us than on Dulles, which only got about 2.5 inches. 

No comments: