Thai military, AIT alumni pitch in to prevent campus flooding
Work began 15 May 2006 on flood prevention embankments surrounding AIT, thanks to negotiations made by the Infrastructure Office with the National Science and Technology Development Agency, the AIT Alumni Association and the Armed Forces Development Command. The negotiations stand to save AIT more than 3.2 million baht.
Topographically the AIT campus is situated in the low land of the Central Plain of Thailand. Without a proper flooding protection system, therefore, the campus will experience flooding from the heavy rainfall during the monsoon season and from the river tide from the north from September to November almost every year. Hence, an embankment from 2 meters to 3 meters high was constructed surrounding the whole campus for flood protection in combination with a water pumping system. This embankment has been properly maintained and has saved the campus from several severe floods in the past.
According to a new land lease agreement, a piece of land on the west side of the AIT campus has been transferred to the NSTDA for the construction of the Science Park. Recently, while transferring the land, the Infrastructure Office successfully negotiated to obtain 18,000 cubic meters of soil worth more than 2.6 million baht from NSTDA for the improvement of the embankment for flooding protection and landscape improvement in the AIT campus.
Those projects include: improving 700 meters of the embankment along the Paholyothin Road, which is now subsided and is about half meter lower than the road; filling the low land behind the AIT name board; filling the ditch and improving the storm drain from Dormitory P to gate 2; filling the road side from the main gate of AIT to gate 3 in order to prevent the damage on the road due to land subsidence; and improving the north embankment of the campus.
With such a huge workload to be completed in a short period of time, and with current facilities and budget limitations, the work could not be carried out by AIT itself. Thus, the Infrastructure Office received cooperation from the AIT alumni network, and the institute is fortunate to receive the cooperation of the Armed Forces Development Command, Thailand, through the AIT Alumni Association Executive Committee. The AFDC has sent three excavators and a dump truck together with a military crew of seven persons. The AFDC team started work 15 May and will continue for about four weeks to finish all the tasks.