Agenda

Levent Ozdemir, President of Ozdemir & Associates, spent 32 years as a Professor of Mining and the Director of Earth Mechanics Institute at the Colorado School of Mines where he developed and taught undergraduate and graduate courses in tunnel design and construction, mechanized rock and soil excavations, geotechnical site investigations and underground mining. He also conducted and directed pioneering research in various aspects of mechanical tunneling. He currently serves as a consultant to the tunneling industry.

Greg Raines,Tunnel Practice Leader, brings nearly 30 years of global expertise in tunnels and underground structures. He actively participates in the U.S. and International Tunneling Associations.

Ike is Brierley Associates’ Tunnel Sector Leader and is licensed as professional engineer and a professional geologist in several states. His interdisciplinary knowledge of engineering and geology, experience as a consultant, owner’s representative, and tunnel contractor is truly unique. Mr. Isaacson’s tunnel experience spans more than 20 years and includes design,  constructability analysis, grouting, ground improvement, ground freezing, geotechnical instrumentation, tunnel rehabilitation, construction logistics, hyperbaric interventions, ground loss mapping and construction forensics. Ike’s broad knowledge, skill sets, experiences, and keen multi-perspective insight provides him with a well-rounded, pragmatic approach to developing Geotechnical Baseline Reports.

Bob Goodfellow is President of Aldea Services Inc. He is a licensed professional engineer in more than a dozen states. Goodfellow has more than 25 years of experience in the tunneling industry and he currently serves as the Chair of the Executive Committee for the Underground Construction Association (UCA of SME). He is co-author of the U.S. tunnel industry guidelines for risk management on tunnel projects.

Nasri Munfah, as the Director of the Tunneling Practice is a senior executive of the firm’s leadership team. He is responsible for developing and implementing long term profitable strategic growth plan to advance the firm’s tunneling practice. He oversees the firm’s tunneling and underground projects and he provides leadership in project pursuit and delivery, development of innovative solutions, marketing, recruitment and professional development of staff.

Leads operations with P/L responsibility, management, sales and marketing of COWI’s North America tunnel and underground business. Ensure that client relations, project development and project execution are successfully implemented for design and construction projects across the US and Canada. Officer and member of senior leadership team responsible for North America strategy and operation of 340 staff in 12 offices.

Don Del Nero, PE, CDT is Vice President and a Tunnel Engineering Director for WSP. He holds a minor in geology, BS in Civil Engineering, MS in Geotechnical Engineering, and has 33 years of experience in tunnel and trenchless design and construction. Along with being an instructor for the Microtunneling Short Course, he is an instructor for the NASTT New Installation Course, Breakthroughs in Tunneling Short-course, and Risk Management in Underground Construction short-course. He had the honor of Chairing the 2018 No-Dig Show, has authored over 40 industry papers and a subchapter on means and methods in the book, “Trenchless Technology: Planning, Equipment, and Methods” by Mohammad Najafi.

Dr. Zhangwei Ning is a geotechnical instrumentation and monitoring expert and the technical manager with Sixense Group USA. His diverse academic and industry experience provides him with a multi-scale perspective in observing and studying soil behaviors: from microscale soil particle motions to macroscale massive ground movements in urban and natural environments. Since joining Sixense in 2013, he has participated in a wide range of complex projects, including: tunnel, deep excavation, bridge, dam, landfill, natural slope, etc. He is the member of DFI testing and evaluation technical committee, leading a force task of developing instrumentation and monitoring short courses.

Dr. Brierley has more than 48 years of experience with both the technical and nontechnical aspects of underground engineering and construction management.  From the technical perspective, Dr. Brierley began his career with the bachelor of science degree in engineering from Tufts University in 1968 and master’s and doctor’s degrees from the University of Illinois in 1970 and 1975, respectively.  Beginning as a project manager in 1970, Dr. Brierley has worked on literally hundreds of projects involving all types of underground design and construction including soil and rock engineering, building foundations, braced excavations, ground improvement and slope stability.

Sanja brings over 30 years of experience in project and engineering management of mega transportation, transit and underground projects. Her ability to bring forward state of the art innovative solutions through collaboration with top industry experts had brought value to many mega-transit programs. She has received Technical Excellence Award and had been recognized as Fellow, for extraordinary carrier-long accomplishments practicing technical excellence and innovative approaches to solving complex tunneling issues, especially related to minimizing impacts of tunneling to densely populated urban environments, communities and businesses. As chair of HNTB’s National Tunnel Practice, Sanja is responsible for establishing and growing the firm’s professional services for tunnels and complex underground structures within the U.S. and select international infrastructure, transportation, transit and rail markets.

Mike Wongkaew is an Associate Vice President and National Tunnel Practice Lead – Northwest for HNTB Corporation. A licensed structural engineer, Mike has 20 years of hands-on experience with the design, analysis and construction of underground structures in seismically active West Coast. Mike is currently leading the underground engineering effort for Sound Transit West Seattle and Ballard Links Extension Project.

Greg is the Practice Leader for Tunnel Construction Management at Jacobs. He has more than 40 years of experience in mining, tunneling, and heavy civil and underground construction with emphasis in construction management and quality control.  His tunneling experience includes Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) excavations in various ranges of rock and soil environments as well as supervision of complex excavations in soft ground conditions.  He has comprehensive experiences in a wide variety of shaft construction methods including complex deep slurry walls, jet grouting, ground-freezing, drilled and conventionally excavated shafts.  Greg is an experienced practitioner in Risk Management and the implementation and management of alternate contract delivery systems for large underground construction projects. Greg is a Certified Construction Manager and a Certified DBIA Professional.

Dr. Vojtech Gall is a principal and co-founder of Gall Zeidler Consultants. He leads GZ’s North American headquarter in Ashburn, Virginia and is primarily responsible for GZ’s North American and South American markets. Dr. Gall has over 30 years of experience in the design, construction, and construction management of tunnels and underground structures. His expertise encompasses soft-ground, mixed-face, and rock-tunneling utilizing Mechanical (TBM), conventional tunneling (SEM/NATM), and cut-and-cover excavation methods.

Attended Fairmont State University, Fairmont WV received Bachelor of Science degree in Electronic Engineering 1986. After college went to work for EIMCO Machinery in Fairmont WV working in the electrical engineering department as engineer providing support for manufacturing of equipment with design and production drawings. While at EIMCO also worked in the product management group that involved extensive travel into the Appalachian coal fields providing tech support for the underground equipment both with customer and field service. In 1993 went to work for Joy Mining Machinery working as technical specialist for 2 years then as sales engineer for next 11 years. In 2006 went to work for Sandvik as Product Line Manager for mechanical cutting providing both customer support and as a liaison to the mechanical cutting factory in Zeltweg Austria. In 2019 moved to Account Manager for Civil / Tunneling customers, mining contractors and engineering firms in product selection and support.

Levent Ozdemir, President of Ozdemir & Associates, spent 32 years as a Professor of Mining and the Director of Earth Mechanics Institute at the Colorado School of Mines where he developed and taught undergraduate and graduate courses in tunnel design and construction, mechanized rock and soil excavations, geotechnical site investigations and underground mining. He also conducted and directed pioneering research in various aspects of mechanical tunneling. He currently serves as a consultant to the tunneling industry.

Paul is a technical/project manager with over 40 years of experience in the heavy infrastructure and tunneling industries. He has a geotechnical background and extensive engineering experience with tunnel boring machine (TBM) manufacturers. Paul specializes in TBM engineering and operation on both the contractor and consultant sides, giving him an understanding of all the elements it takes to effectively construct and operate tunnel boring machines on tunnel projects. Paul has been involved in the design, manufacturing, and commissioning of tunnel boring machines. He has extensive experience in various types of ground of tunneling works with EPB, slurry, and rock TBMs supplied to road, water hydro, utility, and metro projects.

Levent Ozdemir, President of Ozdemir & Associates, spent 32 years as a Professor of Mining and the Director of Earth Mechanics Institute at the Colorado School of Mines where he developed and taught undergraduate and graduate courses in tunnel design and construction, mechanized rock and soil excavations, geotechnical site investigations and underground mining. He also conducted and directed pioneering research in various aspects of mechanical tunneling. He currently serves as a consultant to the tunneling industry.

Paul is a technical/project manager with over 40 years of experience in the heavy infrastructure and tunneling industries. He has a geotechnical background and extensive engineering experience with tunnel boring machine (TBM) manufacturers. Paul specializes in TBM engineering and operation on both the contractor and consultant sides, giving him an understanding of all the elements it takes to effectively construct and operate tunnel boring machines on tunnel projects. Paul has been involved in the design, manufacturing, and commissioning of tunnel boring machines. He has extensive experience in various types of ground of tunneling works with EPB, slurry, and rock TBMs supplied to road, water hydro, utility, and metro projects.

Mr. Swartz is a civil engineer with experience on a variety of different projects from airports to power plants to tunnels. His responsibilities have included inspection, planning, and design. Mr. Swartz’s primary career focus has been centered on heavy civil projects throughout the United States. He is a member of Black & Veatch’s Geo-Engineering Department specializing in all forms of tunneling and underground construction. Recent heavy civil projects have provided valuable experience in highly sensitive, urban environments where community involvement is vital to the project’s success.

Dr. Boyce holds a Ph.D. degree from UC Berkeley in geotechnical engineering. Currently, he is a senior associate with McMillen Jacobs Associates. Glenn has been involved in many tunneling projects, including serving as the project manager for the Portland CSO projects. He is a registered engineered in many states and has been a speaker in our tunneling and microtunneling short courses for many years.

Dennis graduated Civil Engineering at Texas A&M University in 1986. Since 1990 he is working for Hayward Baker/Keller North America, and currently serves as Senior Vice President. He is managing 10 Global Product Teams responsible for product development, standards and best practices worldwide, and 6 North American Product Teams, responsible for best practices, risk and standards in North America. Manager of the KDAQ project, Keller’s data driven project to become a more site digitized company in the future. Dennis was DFI’s Soil Mixing Chair from 2009 to 2017, and contributed to publication in 2015 “Guidelines for Soil Mixing”, prepared by the Soil Mixing Committee. In 2019 he received Keller Innovation Award.

Niels Kofoed is currently the TBM Tunnel manager for Kiewit-Shea Constructors, AJV, for the $700mil Rondout-West Branch Bypass Tunnel project in Newburgh, NY. Niels received his B.Sc. in Civil and Structural Engineering from the Danish Technical University, Copenhagen, Denmark in 1987 and his M.Sc. in Civil Engineering from University of Florida in 1989.

Tom focuses his practice on construction law and civil litigation, and leads Roetzel’s Construction Law practice, which has been recognized by US News & World Report as one of the best law firms nationally and/or regionally for construction and construction litigation from 2012 to 2021.

Levent Ozdemir, President of Ozdemir & Associates, spent 32 years as a Professor of Mining and the Director of Earth Mechanics Institute at the Colorado School of Mines where he developed and taught undergraduate and graduate courses in tunnel design and construction, mechanized rock and soil excavations, geotechnical site investigations and underground mining. He also conducted and directed pioneering research in various aspects of mechanical tunneling. He currently serves as a consultant to the tunneling industry.