Jim was born in Los Angeles in 1926, received his discharge from the U.S. Navy in 1946, and then enrolled at Stanford University as an aspirant civil engineer. He received his B.S.C.E. degree in 1950 and immediately went to work for Macco Corporation. It didn’t take long for him to realize that his vocation was construction engineering. In 1957, Jim joined Jacobs Associates. Jim immediately assuming responsibility for the firm’s construction engineering services. He became a principal in 1963, was made president in 1974, and was elected chairman of the board of directors in 1985. Jim remained at Jacobs Associates for nearly 40 years.
According to Jacobs Associates’ current president Bill Edgerton, “Jim was an engineer’s engineer, with a reputation for being able to solve almost any construction problem. He was extremely detail oriented and was known for his meticulous construction drawings and calculations, which helped establish a quality standard within the firm. Jim was a recognized expert in excavation support for deep cutand-cover structures, and the memory of his significant contributions will continue at Jacobs Associates.”
Most of Jim’s noteworthy projects have been underground structures, excavation support systems, cofferdams, and custombuilt construction plants. Some of the designs he handled include tunneling alternatives to open-cut construction on sections of rapid transit systems in both San Francisco and Washington, D.C.; the Yacambu Irrigation Tunnel, Venezuela; the Arenal Power Tunnel, Costa Rica; and the Renton Effluent Transfer System tunnels in Seattle. In addition, he undertook significant consulting assignments on more than 30 tunnels in the U.S. and abroad. In the 1970s he published several papers and studies on these subjects under federal research grants, and these papers are still relevant today.
Excavation support systems incorporating Jim’s designs were used on more than half of the San Francisco BART stations; the N-1 and N-2 sewer tunnels in San Francisco; an 8,000-foot-long (2438m) open trench in San Francisco for the West Side Sewage Transport; the Chicago Deep Tunnel (TARP) project; the Victoria Arts Center foundations in Melbourne, Australia; and individual cut-and-cover contracts for subway tunnels in New York City, Atlanta, Boston, and Washington, D.C. After retiring from Jacobs Associates, Jim continued his involvement in consulting and dispute resolution through 2009. He was a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers and received a Golden Beaver Award for Engineering in 1987.
James Wilton
