February 8th Update

I have been away for a couple of weeks and have returned to see that the digging below the Temple building continues and the distance between the building and the ground continues to increase.  There is a lot of activity now to the north of the building what appears to be a temporary working quarters and a possible cement plant.

It is difficult to see in the pictures that there is a large steam shovel inside the building continuing to dig out underneath the building.  I was told that while I was away that the area that looks like a road path around the building in a circle; there was a large digging devise that came in and tunneled in that area. They said it looked as if it was drilling a concrete solution into the ground building a barrier around the building.  We assume it is to allow them to start to block off the water under ground to continue to work deeper (only speculation on my part). It does look as if they have created a water drainage system under the building.  I was told that last week there were large pools of water under the building.  It is impressive to see the building standing in the air.  As I have said before my parking stall is right to the west of the building and each day as I look out it appears as if the building is floating above me. It is really impressive!

Floating building

The work on the Temple continues and now the building is starting to "float."  I have attached a picture that shows the Northeast corner of the building has now been dug out underneath and the building is resting on the steel I beams and you can see daylight and men are walking underneath it. It looks to me that the building is possibly10 feet off the ground and they continue to progress around the building both on the inside and the outside.  It is an interesting sight!  I would love to know the amount of soil that is being hauled away, the trunks are lined up down the street and they keep digging and hauling it away.

                              The Northeast corner of the building stands above the ground

January 8th 2013 Update

The last few days have been interesting to watch the work around the Temple as they have sured up the base of the Temple with steel I beams and it looks like the building is now resting on all the beams.  It looks as if in the near future they will start to excavate the old foundation and start to dig down to add a possible basement and new foundation.  They have also been burying large steel pylons around the parimeter of the building which will support the ground while they excavate and build underground structures such as parking.  I have attached a picture of the machine preparing to start to drive the pylon.  It is an interesting process to watch them drive the beems which stand about 2 stories tall.  When they hit something solid which I am assuming is rocks the machine viberates the beams until it starts moving again.  Our whole bulding shakes as they viberate the beem.  It is pretty amazing that it only takes maybe 5 to 10 minutes to drive them in.  In the picture you can see that there are walls going up to the east of the building on the beams and they have already hauled out a lot of dirt.

December 20th Update

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had heard someone say that they thought that the contractors would be somehow raising the building so that they could rebuild the foundation to current earthquake code and sure up the building. The last couple of weeks they have been working around the base of the building drilling deep holes and building concrete posts. I observed that they were doing the same on the inside of the building and now can see that they have built a steel I-beam support system all around the base of the building so that the building will be resting on this framework. I am guessing that once in place they will start to remove the old foundation and essentially suspending the building in air while they build a new substructure underneath it. I also heard it said that they would be going down several stories; I will be interested to see if that is the case because of the high water table. See pictures below - the steel I-beam supports are near the bottom of the building sticking about 4 feet out, sorry the pictures are not so clear, the angle of the sun and glare off my window hinder the view but you should be able to see them and get an idea of what it looks like. Also you can see that it looks like we will be having a "White Christmas" lows in the teens and chance of more snow on the weekend.

I wish you all a very merry Christmas!

November Update

I know it has been a little while since my last post but the work on the Provo City Center Temple has been progressing.  It was noted in the local media that in the process of additional excavation that they found one of the earliest know Baptismal fonts in Utah county The font area sat just to the east of my parking stall and I noticed that they were very carefully digging around something that they had found.  Here is a link to KSL reporting - http://www.ksl.com/?nid=1016&sid=22966683

The Article from the Daily Herald - http://www.heraldextra.com/historic-provo-baptistry/image_d3011c5e-2e94-11e2-bc91-001a4bcf887a.html

I have observed that they along with creating an interrior concrete support have removed all of the exterrior scaffling and have started to do work around the foundation.  They are also been doing drilling on the interior and a few times I have noticed water running on the inside and it has been pumped out into a make shift pond north of the building.  I do not know if they have run into water issues due to the high water table or it is run off from the concrete work.  I know that in the work of building a new parking structure for Nu Skin they have had to pump out water and it appears that they are having to build a drainage system to remove ground water.  I do not know if this will be an issue for the Temple.  I have been told and only know it as rumor that they will in some manner hoist the building off of the original foundation so that a new one can be make to withstand earthquakes.  They continue work and pouring concrete for the underground entrance to the parking structure that will replace the current Nu Skin Parking.

I have attached the following picture to show the current progress.

Spetember 20th Update

The progress of this week has been a significant effort to put in place the rebar reinforcement for the exterior walls.  If you look close in the picture towards the east and south walls or the walls to the left of the picture where the "Manlift" is you can see the rebar attached to the walls.  They are putting a significant effort into strengthening the walls so that they will hold the new roof and last for a significant time.  They have started to excavate to the east of the Nu Skin building to start to contruct the driveway to the underground parking.  Those of you that attended the Utah County multi Stake conference heard Elder Walker say that the projected Dedication date is in 2015.  To restore the building will be a long and drawn out process.

Progress Sept. 11, 2012

Here is a picture of the progress on the Temple.  They are spending a considerable amout of time adding support and structural strength to the existing exterior walls.  I have watched them lift a significant amount of rebar and put it in place as support.  They have started to excavate just to the east of the Nu Skin highrise to start to prepare for the enterance to the future underground parking structure.  Nu Skin has sped up the progress of building a new parking structure on the corner of 1st South and 2nd West so that the current parking structure to the south of our building and west of the Temple can be demoalished to allow for the underground parking. Currently the annex between the parking and our building has been removed.  I will keep you posted as I see any major developments.