Taking a Birds Eye View of Fargo’s New Flood Wall

A drone video shot by Industrial Builders and Diederich Drone Service is giving us an aerial view of the nearly completed flood wall in downtown Fargo.

The video offers a unique perspective on the new structure.

Houston Engineering played a big part in the design and oversight of the flood wall project and Randy Engelstad has been there since the project’s infancy.

You can see in the video that the wall begins at NP Avenue.

Beginning at NP Avenue the wall has a few notable features like the fact it isn’t exactly straight.

“The flood wall it’s not a straight line,” explained Englstad. “We kind of wanted to break up the appearance of the flood wall so it didn’t look like you were standing in a prison.”

One of the first things you’ll probably notice about this wall is that there’s a big hole allowing 1st Avenue to go through.

That’s so they can keep 1st Avenue functioning throughout the year but in the case of a flood, they can bring out temporary barriers to close off the intersection.

“The city would deliver these aluminum planks and posts and they would put the posts in the flood wall footing and then stack the planks in order to protect the area from flood waters,” said Englstad. “That way we can keep 2nd Street open even during a flood.”

There are a few other openings along the wall that utilize the same system.

The most challenging aspect of the project can’t be seen with the naked eye though.

“A lot of the harder stuff was underground. All those utilities are deep underground,” said Englstad.

Dealing with cables, pipes and other connections below the wall proved to be a bit of a logistical nightmare.

Luckily, all of that is in the past, but that doesn’t mean the job is over.

“They’re going to do another landscaping project here in 2017 or 2018 that has lots of different types of plantings and trees and it’s really going to kind of turn this corridor back to what riverbanks should look like,” said Englstad.

Once the project is complete, there will be access inside the borders of the wall for recreation.

The next milestone in the project will be the opening of 2nd Street which is set for early to mid–November.