Todd Keller couldn’t decide what he wanted to do career-wise as he neared the end of his time at a college preparatory school in the late 1980s. “I struggled with what I wanted to be when I grew up,” he recalls.
He enrolled at Northern Arizona University and discovered that there was a construction management program. “A light bulb went off,” says Granite Construction Co. vice president.
After graduating, he applied to contractors with a presence in Arizona, and Granite responded immediately. After a decade, he left to join another company in New Zealand. “The grass was definitely ‘greener,'” he says with humor, “but in the end Granite was my home.”
Granite called him back after three years to run a large federal business program. He now leads business development for several states, including his other home of Arizona, but his primary passion is tackling unique and challenging projects with collaborative delivery models.
The roughly $200 million Polychrome Bridge project in Alaska’s Denali National Park was just that. When the Granite team reviewed the Federal Highway Administration’s design-build application to reconnect Denali Park Road after the Pretty Rocks landslide, the risks were too daunting: The remoteness of the site would complicate the delivery of materials. The construction season was very short. And the geological conditions were extremely unstable, with the landslide still actively eroding the mountainside. Keller suggested that Granite respond to the request, but with the caveat that it would only bid on the work if the FHWA switched to the construction manager’s general contractor method of delivery.
The agency and the National Park Service agreed. “FHWA was with us the whole time,” Keller says.
Granite assembled a team to tackle each of the job’s complex challenges. KWH Constructors Inc. and its Somerset Engineering division did the truss structure detailing, construction engineering, pre-assembly, construction and on-site launching. They and DBM Vircon, the 3D integrated design detailer, worked in conjunction with FHWA consultant Jacobs. The team included steel supplier and manufacturer Gunderson-Greenbrier; Hamilton for substructure and crane operational support; DBM for underground elements; Arctic foundations providing thermosyphons; and Advanced Blasting for rock demolition.
“The Polychrome project is a unique and tough environment, with a complicated team structure,” says Keller. “There are a lot of different personalities and experience levels to deal with. To bring them together, we’ve communicated and adopted a ‘best for the project’ philosophy.”
The team successfully launched the 475-foot steel truss in August.
“Todd’s leadership was instrumental in forming a successful owner-designer-builder team,” says Gary Conner, senior bridge engineer at Jacobs. “His positive approach to finding solutions to the challenges posed by this unique project helped foster a collaborative and enjoyable work environment.”
Tyler Vander Linden, CEO of KWH adds, “The first thing that comes to mind when we think of Todd is the ‘best for the project’ mentality. That phrase comes out of Todd’s mouth almost continuously. And I wouldn’t say that saying is new or unheard of, but I would say that Todd was the first person that I’ve worked closely with that really believed in that saying and did it without interest.”
He notes that “Todd really believed in the KWH team, even though we had no history together. He did his homework and once he was convinced that we were the right partner for the team, he did everything in his power to help us and make it successful. He knew the only way the project was going to be successful was if KWH and all the subcontractors were successful.”
