'800 Bridges' design work up for grabs

The Missouri Department of Transportation is in the final stages of negotiating a gargantuan government contract with a group of companies collectively known as Missouri Bridge Partners to finance, design, rebuild and maintain 802 of the state’s worst bridges. But the team’s lead engineering firm – Pasadena, Calif.-based Parsons Transportation Group – hasn’t indicated it will subcontract with its Missouri counterparts for much of the bridge work, and MoDOT officials are likewise mum on details.

MoDOT Outreach Coordinator Bob Brendel said the department’s Safe & Sound Bridge Improvement Program – dubbed 800 Bridges – is expected to cost between $600 million and $800 million, up about $200 million from initial estimates.

“The total cost will be more than that by the time you figure in the financing,” Brendel said.

Construction work handled by Clarkson Construction in Kansas City and Fred Weber Inc. in Maryland Heights will account for the biggest piece of the contractual casserole being cooked up in Jefferson City, but the engineering component also represents a healthy serving of business for hungry in-state firms.

Bruce Wylie, executive director of the Missouri Society of Professional Engineers, said the trade group wholeheartedly supports the effort to make Missouri’s bridges safer; it’s MoDOT’s shift away from traditional competitive bidding that worries him and others within his organization.

“That’s been our concern all along – design-build reduces the number of entities that can compete,” he said, suggesting that some MSPE members have hung their hats on the project’s magnitude. “In reality, I think a lot of subcontracting will go on, and I think a lot of Missouri firms will get some of this work, simply because of logistics.”

Bridge the gap?

In December, the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission selected Missouri Bridge Partners as the “best value” team to lead the project, which includes at least one bridge in each of the state’s 114 counties.

Missouri Bridge Partners is led by San Antonio-based Zachry American Infrastructure, which essentially functions as the project developer, MoDOT’s Brendel said. UBS Investment Bank and Hastings Funds Management – international investment banking firms with offices in New York City – are responsible for financing the complex project. Kansas City engineering firm HNTB is in charge of quality control and inspection, and Infrastructure Corporation of America is a Nashville-based company that will oversee 25 years of bridge maintenance.

MoDOT officials referred questions about the team’s strategy for bridge engineering work to Dwight Munk, senior project manager with Zachry American Infrastructure.

Munk did not respond to several phone messages seeking comment, and Parsons Transportation Group officials also could not be reached.

As word has spread that California-based Parsons might farm out the bulk of the work, Brendel said MoDOT has received calls from in-state firms wondering if the door to the bridge business has been shut. His response: “I don’t know.”

“We’ve assumed all along there would be plenty of opportunities for subcontract work, but I’m not aware of any particulars on the engineering side,” he added. “We’ve referred any inquiries we’ve had to the lead for the teams.”

MSPE members said the door still appears cracked open, but they acknowledged that Missouri Bridge Partners is under no obligation to contract with in-state firms. MoDOT spokesman Jeff Briggs declined to comment when asked if the department will require the team to contract with Missouri engineers for a certain percentage of the project work.

Neil Fossnight, vice president of Springfield-based Scott Consulting Engineers, said plenty of Missouri engineering firms are qualified to do the required bridge design and consulting work.

“The bridges … would be something that would be very easily parceled out to a number of smaller consultants,” he said. “It would seem like there would maybe be a way … where they could make some provisions for giving (Missouri Bridge Partners) credit for using people in the state. I think that would be good.”

No guarantees

One person who considers himself an advocate of both Missouri’s bridge project and the state’s engineering firms is Jim Anderson.

Anderson is vice president of the Highways and Transportation Commission – the panel that will review and vote on the contract with Missouri Bridge Partners. He’s also president of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce, which counts more than a dozen engineering firms among its members.

“I can’t help but believe the vendor will look at using Missouri firms because they’re right here – they’re on the ground, so to speak,” Anderson said. “Is there a guarantee? No. … But I’m optimistic that the concerns and fears that people have hopefully will not come to pass.”

Commissioners won’t learn details of the contract until the confidential negotiating phase is complete. That process already has taken three months, which concerns Anderson.

“Time is an issue, and I think we have to get something done quickly to get anything done this construction season,” he said. “We are going to take the time necessary to make the right decision, and frankly, we are not unwilling to walk away if it doesn’t make sense. This thing has to make sense.”

Anderson said he’s hopeful the commission will consider a final version of the contract at its April 9 meeting in Jefferson City.

SBJ.net Poll

Should Missouri Bridge Partners – the team negotiating a contract with MoDOT to rehabilitate and maintain 800 of the state’s worst bridges – be required to use in-state engineering firms? Why or why not?

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Finding the ‘Best Value’

Missouri Department of Transportation selected Missouri Bridge Partners for the Safe & Sound Bridge Improvement Program – dubbed 800 bridges – after using a point system to evaluate the multidisciplinary team’s proposal for tackling the $600 million-plus project, which seeks to rehabilitate 802 of the state’s worst bridges.

MoDOT’s evaluation process included pass/fail items as well as scored items. Here are the two scoring categories and point totals assigned to each component:

Technical elements

Technical strategies – 15 points

Traffic maintenance – 10 points

Public information – 5 points

Cost elements

Net present worth – 40 points

Minimal cash outlay for first 5 years – 20 points

Uniform annual payments – 10 points[[In-content Ad]]