Recent Milestones

Over the past year several new milestones have been achieved. Some of these are as follows:

1. Naresh helped the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) successfully launch a new 2-day Virtual Workshop format that will be used to replace the webinar format of online delivery. The workshop allows for more in-depth interactive training. Naresh has already delivered 2 workshops in this format, one on Compaction of Soils in November 2020 and another on Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls in May 2021.
2. As noted in a previous update in 2019, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) selected the team of Applied Research Associates, Inc. (ARA) to update the “Soils and Foundations” (S&F) manual to Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) platform. This updated manual will be re-titled as “Geotechnical Fundamentals for Transportation Projects” (GFTP) and will become the Geotechnical Engineering Circular (GEC) 1. ARA teamed with NCS GeoResources, LLC (NCSG) to develop the update. As with the previous S&F manual, Naresh will continue to be the lead author for this update and will co-author the manual with Jerry DiMaggio of ARA. This manual will include updated guidance in all of its chapters and will constitute a major update. The technical portion of the manual has been completed and is currently undergoing a compliance check to meet the Federal 508 regulations.
3. The technical walk-through for the instructor led training (ILT) for the Geotechnical Engineering Circular (GEC 10) titled “Drilled Shafts: Construction Procedures and Design Methods” was completed in March 2021. NCS GeoResources, LLC, has been working as a subcontractor to Applied Research Associates, Inc. (ARA). Naresh is a co-Subject Matter Expert (co-SME) with Jerry A. DiMaggio on this effort.
4. The Transportation Research Board (TRB) is currently celebrating its Centennial year. As part of these celebrations, it has commissioned publication of Centennial Circulars in different disciplines which will contain significant developments over the last 100 years. For the Centennial Circular related to foundation design, Naresh was invited to submit two papers related to development of Service limit state based on the Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) methodology. These two papers were reviewed and accepted for publication. These papers will be available in Summer 2021.
5. Launch of redesigned website on May 24, 2021. You are currently viewing this post on our new website. We will be continuing to refine it as we get time and build on the same great features and resources we had on our previous website.

Stay tuned for more details on the above items as well as other items (including new manuals and papers to be added to downloads) in near future……. Thank you for your support!