Not only will construction to the city's largest bridge take longer than expected, but the price tag will be much bigger too.
City Council approved the awarding of the Lakeshore Drive Fred Lefebvre Memorial Overpass construction contract to Miller Paving Limited for just under $6.95 million on Monday night.
That brings the total anticipated cost of repairing the structure to upwards of $7.61 million, including the design, construction and inspection.
But that contract, which was the lowest of the nine bidders who threw their hat in the ring, is almost $2 million more than anticipated, with only $5.74 million set aside in original capital funding.
As a result, council’s approval also paves the way for $1.4 million being added in the city’s 2017 capital budget and an additional $467,433 transferred from the complete general capital projects reserve fund.
“Although there was a very good response to the tender […] the prices were significantly higher than expected from the estimate that we had from the consultant,” said Coun. Tanya Vrebosch, the chair of Engineering and Works.
Originally, the city was offering a bonus for completing the project early and a penalty for finishing late. But after hearing back from the pool of nine tender candidates, the penalty fee is now being built into the overall cost.
“They all said, basically, that they would have to build in the penalty cost because nobody could finish it on time,” Vrebosch explained of the bidders’ meeting.
The bridge was built in 1967 and a lifecycle assessment report from 2008 recommended that the bridge is in need of serious repairs, including the replacement of the entire deck, sidewalks, parapet walls and asphalt, as well as the rehabilitation to the substructure.
“I was very encouraged, when I read this report, at the fact that we had multiple bidders that came forward,” said Coun. Mac Bain. “It was encouraging to see a project of this size had that many people that would be interested on working on it.”
The two senior levels of government have granted $3 million from the Small Communities Fund, prompting Bain to request that the city somehow recognize and acknowledge their contribution in the construction process.
“They are quite happy when they get recognition for the investments that they make in the communities,” he said.
The project is being broken up into two phases that will keep the bridge fully open for most of this summer. The bottom of the bridge and major substructure repairs will be addressed this year, while the new asphalt, sidewalks, guard rails and light standards will be completed in 2017.
Lanes may be reduced intermittently this summer, but should remain open as usual for the most part. Even with the bulk of the surface work taking place next summer, at no point is the construction anticipated to shut all lanes down completely.
With the contract now awarded, the substructure construction is expected to start in June.
