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Dive brief:
- If you don’t succeed at first, submit your offer again. That’s what Los Angeles-based Tutor Perini did to finally win a $1.66 billion contract from the Honolulu Rapid Transit Authority, which shelved the project four years ago amid budget shortfalls and bids initial too high during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Tutor Perini announced on August 15 that HART awarded him the contract for the City Center Guideway and Stations project in Honolulu, Segment 3 of the agency’s larger $10 billion Skyline initiative. Ron Tutor, the company’s president and CEO, had said the contractor he presented his offer again on an earnings call last year.
- The scope of work under the contract, which Tutor Perini expects to be completed by mid-September, includes the design and construction of six stations and approximately 3 miles of elevated rail track that will terminate just east of downtown from Honolulu. Chantilly, Virginia-based Parsons will serve as a design subcontractor on the job, Tutor Perini said in the news release.
Diving knowledge:
This is at least the second go at the project for Tutor Perini, who was part of the Imua Transit Honolulu Joint Venture which submitted a $2.7 billion bid for the work in 2020. Parsons, as well as Granite Construction and Traylor Brothers, made up the other members of the group at the time.
Tutor Perini and Parson will now begin design for the project immediately after the contract is signed, with construction expected to begin in the second half of 2025. The contractor estimates that the project will be substantially completed by 2030.
On its project website, HART said service relocation work for Segment 3 of the project had already begun in the downtown Honolulu area.
As part of these efforts, HART decided in 2021 to shift part of the alignment to the “mauka,” or mountain, side of the corridor. Known as the “Makua Shift,” this approach will significantly reduce the amount of utilities that must be moved, while also shortening the construction timeline, the agency said.
In Segment 2 of the Skyline project, the relocation of utilities caused costly construction delays. A Shimmick/Traylor/Granite the joint venture sued HART last year for $99 million and eventually reached a $60 million settlement with the agency. Completion of this segment is scheduled for 2025.
History of delays
Tokyo-based Hitachi Rail Honolulu JV broke ground in 2011 on Segment 1 of the Skyline project, which included 11 miles of track and nine stations. This segment opened in 2023.
Beset by numerous delays and cost increases, incl 56 change orders in the Segment 2 contract, according to Honolulu Civil Beat: The 19-station, 18.9-mile Skyline project was originally slated for completion in 2020 at a total cost of $3 billion.
Because of the cost overruns, HART has had to submit at least six recovery plans to the Federal Transit Administration to explain how the project would end up taking into account the cost escalations. In fact, the New York Times characterized him as one of the more expensive transportation efforts in the US
According to HART, this contract will trigger the release of the next $250 million in federal funding under the project’s amended full funding grant agreement, executed on February 2. HART has previously received approximately $931 million under this grant.
Tutor, who has pointed to the company’s earnings calls to highlight multiple instances where projects were pulled or stopped after the company had submitted the low bid, said the company is ready to get to work in Segment 3.
“Tutor Perini has a long and successful history of building large and complex light rail projects in multiple cities across the United States, and we look forward to working with HART to see this project through to success,” Tutor said in the statement.
