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Donald F. Dwyer, P.E.
Geotechnical Engineer
4 Woodlot Court, Waterford, NY 12188
Cell: (518) 250-9789; Home: (518) 237-9010
e-mail: Donald.F.Dwyer.PE@gmail.com
Work History
ENGINEERING CONSULTANT FROM MAY 2016 TO CURRENT
•Develop cost-effective solutions to meet their needs
•Part time instructor for NETTCP (Northeast Transportation Training and Certification
Program)
GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEER FROM AUGUST 1981 TO APRIL 2016, WITH THE NYSDOT GEOTECHNICAL
ENGINEERING BUREAU
HIGHWAY DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION SECTION
Section Head, June 1997 to April 2016
Associate Soils Engineer, March 9, 1998 to April 20, 2016
As Section Head, my responsibilities include:
§ Manage the HD&C Section to support the Regions and other Departmental Units to progress
the Department programs in all modes of transportation.
§ Provide leadership in the implementation of advanced technology and new construction
methods in the geotechnical field in the assigned areas of responsibility to improve quality
and efficiency. Example, polymer injection for subgrade improvement.
§ Initiated and oversaw the development of the Geotechnical Design Manual, “Bureau in a
Box”.
§ Supervise 8 civil engineers, one technician, one clerk, and one keyboard specialist
§ Manage the General Soils Laboratory, which is responsible for assuring quality of gravels
used in construction.
§ Ensuring that proper geotechnical input is provided at the scoping stage, and that it is carried
through detailed design and construction.
§ Provide support to the Construction division and Claims Unit on contract dispute resolution
and claims settlement on all soils-related work. Served as Expert Witness on several cases.
§ Analyze construction costs and materials items, including recycled materials, to ensure high
benefit/cost ratios and proper performance.
§ Maintain support of the Regional Geotechnical Sections through the Area Engineers for
activities that affect quality of geotechnical input on the capital program. This is
accomplished through technical training, providing uniformity in application of
specifications and control procedures, and evaluating Regional Soils resources.
§ Develop and establishing standards in the form of control procedures, specifications, design
manuals, and maintaining contact with industry groups on these issues. Ensure that practices
are current.
§ Perform investigations to evaluate the use of recycled materials in highway projects.
Evaluated materials include fly ash, bottom ash, crushed glass, recycled concrete aggregate,
reclaimed asphalt pavement, crushed toilets, ceramic insulators, catalytic converters,
shredded tires and dredge spoil.
§ Include the use of recycled materials in pilot projects to evaluate their effectiveness.
§ Assist municipalities with evaluating the use of recycled materials in local projects. I

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assisted Delaware County in their use of tire chips beneath their pavement subbase layer.
HIGHWAY DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION SECTION
Civil Engineer II, Area Engineer to Region 8, March, 1995 to June, 1997
Area Engineer to Region 8.
§Functioned as a technical liaison between the Bureau, Main Office Functional Units, and the
Region on geotechnical-related matters.
§Investigated projects in planning and design phase by reviewing all available information to
identify potential soils problems.
§Reviewed project documents for inclusion of soils-related recommendations.
§Provided assistance to Regional construction staff to solve soils-related problems.
SUBSURFACE EXPLORATION SECTION
Civil Engineer II, December, 1993 to March, 1995
§Produced Terrain Reconnaissance Reports at the request of Area Engineers and Regional
personnel.
§Designed walls and corrective treatments for canal projects. Designs performed included
soldier pile walls, sheeting, bulkheads, and grouting treatments to repair leaks in canal
locks and embankments.
§Performed a safety inspection of all Class A dams in the state.
HIGHWAY DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION SECTION
Civil Engineer II, Area Engineer to Region 11, July, 1987 to December, 1993
Area Engineer to Region 11. Similar duties performed for Area Engineer to Region 8.
HIGHWAY DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION SECTION
Civil Engineer I, Assistant to Area Engineer to Region 11, July, 1986 to July, 1987
Assistant to Area Engineer to Region 11.
§Assisted Senior Soils Engineers with their duties of Area Engineer previously described.
§Supported design and construction efforts by performing analyses related to pile capacities,
wall design, rock socket depths, and tiebacks.
GEOTECHNICAL DESIGN UNITS
Civil Engineer I, Designer, August, 1982 to July, 1987
§Performed design functions in the Roadway Foundations Section and Structures Foundation
Section.
§Design functions included settlement and stability analyses for highway embankments and
cuts, pile capacity and type determination, excavation support systems for stage
construction, bearing capacity analysis, and lateral load analysis for piles and drilled
shafts.
GEOTECHNICAL DESIGN UNITS AND SOILS LABS
Junior Engineer, August, 1981 to August, 1982
Learned the functions and skills needed to determine the physical and engineering properties of
soils in the Soil Mechanics Laboratory and the General Soils Laboratory. Rotated through the
Bureau’s design sections (Roadway Foundations Section, Structure Foundations Section), and the
Highway Design and Construction Section to learn their basic functions.
Education and Honors
STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BUFFALO

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Bachelor of Science, Civil Engineering, May 1981
Member of national honor society Chi Epsilon.
Excellence In Engineering award, 2000, for exceptional teamwork with the Mechanically
Stabilized Earth Structure (MSES Section 554) Task Force.
Excellence in Engineering award 2009, for pioneering the use in New York State of tire shreds as
lightweight fill and embankment material.
National Activities
§ AASHTO Subcommittee on Bridges (T-15, Substructures and Retaining Walls) member,
May 1999 to 2013.
§ AASHTO Subcommittee on Bridges (T-20, Tunnels) member, May 2005 to present.
§ NCHRP project panel Chair for 24-21 LRFD Soil Nailing Design and Construction
Specifications (2002).
§ NCHRP project panel Chair for 04-31 (FY 2003) to evaluate “Relevant Acceptance Test
Procedures for Recycled Materials Produced from PCC and HMA Used as Unbound
Pavement Base or Subbase Aggregate”.
§ NCHRP project panel Chair for project 24-31, LRFD Design and Construction
Specifications for Shallow Foundations.
§ NCHRP project panel member for project 12-70, Seismic Analysis of Retaining Walls,
Buried Structures and Embankments.
§ NCHRP project panel member for project 12-89 LRFD For Tunnel Design
§ NCHRP project panel member for project 12-103 Bridge Foundation Superstructure
Tolerance to Total and Differential Foundation Movements
§ NCHRP 20-07 Task 261 Best Practices for Implementing Quality Control and
Quality Assurance for Tunnel Inspection - member
§ NCHRP 20-07 Task 276 Development of Guidelines for Rehabilitation of Existing highway
and Rail Transit Tunnels – panel member
§ NCHRP 41-05 Synthesis, Design Fires in Tunnels – panel member
§ NCHRP 42-05 Synthesis, Long-Term Performance of Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE)
Walls
Special Assignments
§ Member of HITEC panel to evaluate Geopier
§ SHRP Implementation Committee-responsible for analyzing and reporting on several
products.
§ AASHTO Ballot Coordinator-coordinated NYSDOT’s annual ballot response for the
AASHTO Subcommittee on Materials.
§ MSES backfill studies-responsible for developing a system to prioritize MSES structures for
further evaluation of backfill material for corrosion potential.
§ Drilled shaft specification task force-participated in the task force, and wrote the
specification for drilled shafts which was endorsed by FHWA and ADSC.
§ Participated in the writing of the problem statement for NCHRP FY 98-”Evaluation of
Tensioned Systems in Geotechnical Applications”.
§ Member of the H-pile and Lagging Wall Committee that radically altered the way H-pile
and lagging walls are specified and paid for, in response to requests from Regional personnel.
§ DOT representative on the Dust Palliatives Task Force.
§ Task Force Leader of the Subsurface Exploration Task Force.
§ Task force Leader for QC/QA of Granular Materials.
§ Task force Chair of the Tire Shred Task Force. Developed material and construction

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specifications, material testing procedures, training course (and conducted the training), QA
process, site selection criteria, settlement and temperature monitoring and water quality
monitoring plan.
§ Task force member of the Optional Flexible Shoulder Task Force.
§ Member of the AGC/DOT Specifications Committee.
§ New Products Evaluation Committee Chair for NYSDOT.
Articles Published
§ “Geotechnical Triage”, Geo-Strata magazine, November/December 2013
§ “Where the Cullet Hits the Road”, Resource Recycling magazine, February 2010.
§ “Fighting Frost Problems in New York State Pavements”, proceedings on Cold Regions
Engineering, August 16-19, 1999, co-authored with Robert Burnett
Technical Reports Written
§ Technical Report “MSES Backfill – Repeatability of Resistivity Testing by the Geotechnical
Engineering Bureau”
§ Technical Report “Tire Shred Initiative: Summary Report”
§ Bureau publication SEM-13 “Ground Anchor Inspector’s Manual”.
§ Case history entitled “A Tied-Back Master Pile and Sheet Pile Bulkhead Supporting a
Tremie Concrete Fill”.
§ Design manual entitled “Charts To Facilitate Computation of Skin Friction on Non-Tapered
Piles”.
§ Applied accepted pressure distribution theories and wrote the computer code for a program
that calculated the distribution of vertical stresses with depth under an embankment load.
§ AASHTO Recommended Practice R21-96 for “Drilling For Subsurface Investigations-
Unexpectedly Encountering Suspected Hazardous Material”.
Public Speaking and Presentations
§ Organize, run, and speak at the annual Regional Geotechnical Engineers’ Meeting (1997-
present).
§ Annual presentation on the function of the geotechnical engineering program for the
Resident Engineer Orientation program.
§ New Sheeting and Cofferdam Specifications, CLSM specs, Granular material control, and
Geosynthetic Reinforced Earth Slope (GRES) specifications, at the Regional Construction
Engineers’ Meeting, March 23, 1998.
§ Changes to Addendum #2, New Geotextile Design Procedure, and Tire Shred Embankment
Construction, at the annual AGC/DOT Conference, December 8, 1999.
§ Drilled Shafts, at Northeast Geotechnical Engineers’ Meeting (NESGEM), October 1, 1997.
§ Fighting Frost in NYS Pavements, at ASCE Tenth International Conference of Cold Regions
Engineering, August 16-19, 1999. Co-author.
§ NYSDOT Experience With Tire Shred Embankments, at NESGEM, November 3, 1999 and
numerous other venues.
§ Recycled Tires in Bridge and Pavement Projects, at the NYS County Superintendents

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Association, Inc., January 19, 2000.
§ Tire Shreds, and The Use of Recycled Materials in NYS, for Engineers Week, February 16,
2000.
§ Delaware Avenue Landslide to the Albany Society of Engineers, March 27, 2001.
§ NYSDOT’s Use of Underdrains and Edgedrains, at the annual meeting of Highway
Superintendents at Ithaca College.
§ Many other presentations, including; London Bridge, New Product Evaluation in NYSDOT,
Earthwork and 203 Items, Winter Earthwork, Pioneering Waterway Technology, Fill-Type
Retaining Walls, Bertha, Alternate QA Process for Granular Material, Geotech for Locals,
The Cold Realities of Drilling on Ice, Shields and Shoring
Training Received
Effective Meeting and Team Skills
Working in Teams
Leading With Soul
Principles of Writing Highway Construction Specifications
Geotextile Engineering
Groundwater and Seepage
Preparation For Claims Litigation
Value Engineering for Highways
Hazardous Waste: Impacts on Highway Project Development, Construction and Maintenance
Construction and Design of Drilled Shafts
Terrain Investigation Using Remote Sensing Techniques
Seepage and Drainage
Soils and Foundations Workshop
Challenges in Supervision and Management: Practical Skills For Supervisors
Persuasive Presentations
Oral Communication Skills
Design of Piles and Drilled Shafts Under Lateral Load
AASHTO National Transportation Management Conference
Load and Resistance Factor Design for Highway Bridge Substructures