Meridian Associates supported Bluewave, a solar farm developer, with design and permitting of the Lake Lashaway 5MW (AC) hybrid photovoltaic (PV) project in North Brookfield, MA. Meridian provided comprehensive technical support highlighted by drone-based LiDAR and traditional Survey work, as well as Engineering Site Design, Stormwater Design and Analysis, Conservation Commission and Planning Board engagement.

Meridian was contracted by Derck & Edson to perform a topographic survey of The Lodge exterior and surrounding site, covering approxi-mately 42,000 SF (0.95 acres). The survey included locating utility rims and collecting invert elevations for drainage and sewer structures using traditional survey methods. TLS was used to generate a point cloud, allowing our team to draft topo-graphic features such as curbs, roadways, pathways, buildings, and veg-etation, and create a TIN surface with 1-foot contours.

Meridian deployed a mobile mapping vehicle along all 44 miles of public roadways in the city to collect billions of laser measurements and tens of thousands of high- resolution images. The comprehensive point cloud database was used to create a seamless Digital Elevation Model (DEM) for modeling and designing the staged re- placement of the City’s sewer system. Furthermore, the survey grade data can also serve as the base information for design and construction drawings for future infra- structure improvement projects across the City.

Meridian Associates, Inc. is pleased to announce that two projects for which it provided civil engineering services have won awards from Engineering News Record (ENR), a leading publication for the Architect, Engineering, and Construction industry. Endicott College’s Cummings School of Nursing & Health Sciences was named an ENR New York / New England Project of the Year Finalist, while The Block at Odell Park located in downtown Beverly received an Award of Merit.

The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has recently proposed new stormwater regulations. Aimed at bolstering resilience to flooding and incentivizing the use of nature-based solutions, the regulatory changes will have significant impact on new and redevelopment projects in the Bay State. Here are five critical elements of the new regulations that we believe our clients should pay particular attention to and which we are monitoring to ensure that they remain in compliance.

When building on parcels of land featuring slopes or other challenging topography, owner, developer, and contractor concerns must extend beyond getting the site foundation-ready. We offer some broad guidelines for effective early construction project erosion control and stormwater measures, as well as some unfortunate examples of what occurs when these measures are not properly put in place.

By properly understanding site conditions, solar developers can achieve a responsible construction sequence while minimizing unwanted and costly impacts. Here are some key guideposts for effective, successful solar power project construction sequencing.

Many owners, developers, and their engineers still take the traditional “gray” infrastructure approach when it comes to stormwater management, thinking of green infrastructure as more expensive, complicated, or little more than an industry trend. Such thinking may be short sighted and lead to missed opportunities.

With New England’s canopy now open, winds generally calm, and before snow covers the terrain, conditions are ideal for securing topographic surveys of your larger acreage PV sites in due diligence or development through aerial Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR).

Challenging occupant-related restrictions and demanding schedules result in rigid project constraints placed on the Survey team by the owner, architect, or design team. Under these conditions, traditional surveying often falls short.

To navigate the morass that can be permitting and site development, you often need experts able to decipher and uncover hidden legal information and secure the public records documentation required to prove your development project meets municipal and other legal requirements.

LiDAR, which uses laser technology to produce extraordinarily robust point cloud site data models, can help solve some of the most common problems developers encounter during site selection, design, permitting, and community acceptance.

Stormwater issues nearly put a client's 2.5 MW solar PV project in Western Massachusetts on life support. Rather than leading to a dead end, we were able to afford them the time and information the developer required to find a new path to a cost-effective, profitable solution.