Caldecott Fourth Bore Project Enters Tame New Phase

Photographer Karl Nielsen has been tracking the Caldecott Fourth Bore Project since excavation first started on the massive $402.1 million project, which is funded in part by MTC. A recent photographic foray revealed a vastly different scene from the early days of the project, which Nielsen captures in this report from the field.

March 27, 2013

The Caldecott Fourth Bore construction zone no longer has the boomtown feel defined by makeshift, temporary structures built in the mud to house large pieces of equipment. It no longer is populated by large men with a lip full of chewing tobacco, wearing thick denim work pants, steel toed rubber boots, hard hats with a faded yellow lamp pointing forward. Miners like "Big Jim" and "Tom the Blaster" have been replaced with inspectors and engineers holding clipboards and walking at a fast clip while looking over the finished product.

What once was a rutted, muddy tunnel floor that could quickly swallow a man's boot is now a perfectly flat, entirely smooth gravel bed ready for the final paving that will be one of the last steps before opening the fourth bore to the public in late 2013. The roadheader with the giant teeth that tore through the layers of rock has been retired, and walls that were once fresh, raw earth revealing material deposited there millions of years ago are now smooth rounded surfaces of concrete and aluminum.

The Caldecott Fourth Bore has entered its final phase of construction, and electricians are installing the last lines of electrical conduit, and road builders are laying the last bits of the roadbed for what will be the new branch of Highway 24 going through the Oakland Hills. Still to come – the complex state-of-the-art fire, life and safety systems that must be installed and tested before the tunnel can open to traffic. But what once was an unruly, uncivilized hole in the side of a hill has been transformed through planning, hard work and many millions of dollars into a very sleek, modern and safe tunnel connecting Contra Costa County and Alameda County, designed and built so well that it seems to be a natural part of the Oakland hills.  

— Karl Nielsen, photographer