A Colorado-based joint venture beat out four competitors Wednesday in the latest attempt to award a contract to build a new bridge on Interstate 40 over the White River.
The bid by Parsons-Mahan totaled $100,801,278.70. Parsons is Parsons Construction Co., which has an office in Westminster, Colo. Mahan is C.J. Mahan Construction LLC, which is based in Grove City, Ohio.
The joint venture's bid wasn't the lowest, but when it was combined with the number of workdays submitted for the project -- 419 -- the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department deemed it the low bid.
For purposes of construction, there are 130 workdays in a calendar year, which means it will take a little over three years to complete the project. Workdays aren't counted between Nov. 15 and March 15, a period in which weather often isn't ideal for construction. Weekends and holidays aren't counted as workdays either.
Another Colorado company, Flatiron Constructors Inc., submitted a $97,812,870.71 bid but said it would need 648 days to complete the project, or about five years.
The other three bidders all submitted higher bids even before the days they submitted were considered. Those bids ranged from $103.6 million to $105.2 million.
The project to replace the 48-year-old bridge was one of 14 projects on which the department opened low bids Wednesday worth $251.5 million.
The low bids on any of the projects won't be final until they have been reviewed for errors or corrections on the basis of the specifications for each project, according to the department, which can reject bids it deems too high.
Wednesday marked the second time this year the department tried to award a contract for the I-40 bridge.
In January, Johnson Bros. Corp., a part of Southland Holdings of Roanoke, Texas, submitted a bid worth $77.7 million, which was markedly lower than the bids submitted by three other contractors at that time.
The next lowest bid opened was $116.7 million from Massman Construction Co. of Kansas City, Mo., which is building the Broadway Bridge over the Arkansas River between Little Rock and North Little Rock.
The next lowest was $125.5 million from Flatiron Constructors.
The Highway and Transportation Department canceled the award to Johnson Bros. in February after agency officials said they found the contractor had not turned in the required documentation for the involvement of businesses owned by members of minority groups in the project on time, as required in the bid specifications.
In March, Johnson Bros. asked a Pulaski County circuit judge to review the department's decision; overturn the department's decision to seek repayment of the bond, which is equal to 5 percent of the contract award, or $3.8 million; and stay enforcement of a ban the department placed on the company from bidding on future state highway projects.
In September, Circuit Judge Mary McGowan signed an order at the request of Johnson Bros. dismissing the judicial review "with prejudice," meaning the review can be refiled.
Danny Straessle, a spokesman for the department, said the parties reached a settlement in which Johnson Bros. agreed to pay the department $2 million.
The contractor also was allowed to continue to bid on state highway projects. Johnson was one of the bidders on the bridge project on Wednesday. Its $103.7 million bid was the third-lowest among the five bidders.
On the basis of comments contractors made on the original bridge specifications, Straessle said, the department made some changes that reduced the risk and, thus, the cost of the project.
A significant change concerned the bridge footings, which support the bridge deck. The department originally specified seal footings, a design involving pouring a special concrete into the river for the foundation without using a cofferdam, which is a temporary, watertight enclosure pumped dry to allow for construction in water, Straessle said.
Contractors deemed the seal-footings plan too risky and the department changed its design requirements to allow cofferdams to be used in a design called "drilled-shaft footings," he said.
The new bridge will be built on the north side of the existing bridge in Prairie County. I-40 is an east-west route. The contractor later will adjust I-40 to tie into the new bridge. The new bridge will be wide enough to accommodate six lanes eventually, Straessle said. On that section, I-40 has four lanes and there are no immediate plans to widen it.
Even though the new bridge is being built alongside the existing bridge, the project will still have an effect on traffic, Straessle said. Trucks hauling material and equipment will have to use makeshift exit and entrance ramps in the vicinity of the bridge.
That effect likely will be considerable. About 26,000 vehicles daily use the section of I-40 in the vicinity of the bridge, according to department data. Other agency data show that about half of the vehicles are tractor-trailer rigs.
The department has assigned the project a road-user cost of $30,000 per day, Straessle said. Road-user costs are the financial effect the project will have on motorists, based on a formula that uses traffic volume, delays, wear and tear on motorists' vehicles and other factors.
The road-user costs then are considered when awarding the bid. Parsons-Mahan's bid of 419 days equals $12,570,000, which is then added to the construction bid for a total of $113,371,278.70, which the department said is the "amount for award consideration."
The "amount for award consideration" for Flatiron was $117,252,870.71, which is arrived at by adding the contractor's $97,812,870.71 bid for construction and its days bid, which was 648, or $19,440,000.
The road-user figure also acts as an incentive and disincentive. If the project is finished early, for every day under the days bid, the contractor will receive a $30,000 bonus with a maximum of 75 days, or $2.2 million. Conversely, the contractor will have to pay $30,000 per day for every day the work exceeds the bid period. The disincentive has no cap, Straessle said.
Other significant projects in which bids were opened, along with the low bid and the bidder, were:
• Widen 1.8 miles of Arkansas 18 to five lanes from two, east from Manila; $35 million; W.G. Yates & Sons Construction Co. of Philadelphia.
• Extend Eighth Street and construct a new interchange at Eighth Street on Interstate 49, make improvements to the U.S. 62/Arkansas 102 interchange on I-49 and add auxiliary lanes between the two interchanges in Bentonville; $28.8 million; Crossland Construction Company Inc. of Columbus, Kan.
• Widen 5.3 miles of U.S. 82 to five lanes from two, between U.S. 425 and Ashley County 411 east of Crossett; $24.6 million; Johnsville Co. LLC of Hermitage.
Metro on 11/03/2016