$94.8M bid selected to fix choked I-49 leg

Road widening, interchange revamp among 46 projects worth $212M let

A map showing major projects that are underway or about to begin on Interstate 49 in Washington and Benton counties.
A map showing major projects that are underway or about to begin on Interstate 49 in Washington and Benton counties.

Bids on another in a string of projects to widen Interstate 49, the major north-south corridor through Northwest Arkansas, were opened Wednesday by the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department.

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A $94.8 million bid by Kiewit Infrastructure South of Fort Worth was the lowest of six bids submitted for the work to widen a small section of I-49 between Porter Road and the Arkansas 112 and U.S. 71B interchanges in Fayetteville.

The I-49 job was one of 46 projects on which low bids worth $212 million were tentatively selected. Of those, 11 were state projects with low bids worth $196.9 million. The others were county road and city street projects.

The I-49 project was by far the biggest on which bids were opened.

In addition to widening the section to three lanes, the work includes improving the flow of traffic on I-49 at the U.S. 71B interchange, which is part of the old Fayetteville Bypass. The interchange provides access to major retail centers, including the Fayetteville Autopark and Steele Crossing, and is a major intersection for thousands of commuters.

About 78,000 vehicles use the 2.91-mile route every day. The department said the project is designed to accommodate the estimated 135,000 vehicles that will be using it daily in 2036.

"It's got to be the busiest, most central intersection in the whole region," said Rob Smith, communications and policy director for the Northwest Arkansas Council, a private, nonprofit organization focused on promoting economic and workforce development and infrastructure throughout the region. "I can tell you there's not an intersection more important than that one."

The project is paid for under the department's interstate rehabilitation program, a $1.4 billion initiative to repair 82 sections of interstate totaling nearly 500 miles. The program is financed, in part, by up to $575 million in bonds that voters approved in 2011, as well as other state and federal revenue.

The project will add to the maze of construction taking place on I-49.

Two projects to widen I-49 to six lanes are ongoing. One is a $28.3 million project to widen a section from U.S. 71B in Johnson to U.S. 412 in Springdale, and the other is a $21.6 million project from U.S. 412 to Wagon Wheel Road, also in Springdale.

Contracts to widen two more sections on I-49 were awarded in June: A $38.7 million project on a section between Arkansas 264 in Rogers, and a $27.7 million project on a section between U.S. 62/Arkansas 102 and Arkansas 73 in Bentonville.

Kiewit said it would take about 3½ years to complete its project.

"We're used to orange barrels and construction," Smith said. "We'll be fine."

Time was a factor in the bid award. Another company, Emery Sapp & Sons Inc. of Columbia, Mo., said it could do the project for $91.9 million, but said it would need five years to complete it.

As a result, Emery Sapp's bid amount for award consideration was $217.1 million when the cost to road users was factored in. Kiewit's bid, when road-user costs were added, came to $181.2 million, hence it was considered the lowest bid.

Such factors as travel delays, vehicle operating expenses, emissions and crashes go into calculating road-user costs.

Kiewit's bid will be reviewed for accuracy by state highway officials before it is formally accepted.

The work in the project goes well beyond a simple widening because it will involve improving the U.S. 71B interchange, officials said.

"As it is today, it is a challenging intersection, particularly southbound," Smith said. "It's not ideal right now, but it's understandable" given what highway engineers had to work with years ago when the section north from there was built as a bypass rather than a through route.

The way the section is designed now coupled with the major retail centers in the vicinity of the interchange makes it a choke point for the region.

"Everybody touches," Smith said. "Right now, it's hard to flow through there. You sit a little bit. This kind of change is a good one."

Danny Straessle, a Highway Department spokesman, said "there is a certain amount of new location" in the project. "It is not just adding a lane to what's already there."

The interchange, as configured now, is like a "big circle of right of way in the middle" of the interstate, he said.

"This project will bring all that together. You won't have these wildly opposite opposing lanes like you do now.

"The major change is it will function more as a through movement than as an exit movement and it will be three lanes [in each direction] straight through."

Other significant projects on which low bids were opened, including the low bid amount and the low bidder, were:

• Reconstruct a 5-mile section of Interstate 530 from Arkansas 104 to U.S. 65B north of Pine Bluff, $29.8 million, Redstone Construction Group Inc. of Little Rock.

• Widen 5.6 miles of U.S. 64 between Crittenden County Road 375 and Arkansas 147 in Crittenden County, $23.3 million, Crisp Contractors Inc. of West Memphis.

• Widen 4.9 miles of U.S. 167 from Hampton south to Arkansas 172 in Calhoun County, $16.8 million, McGeorge Contracting Co. Inc. of Pine Bluff.

• Construct Arkansas 13 between Arkansas 36 and Arkansas 16 in White County, $11.4 million, McGeorge Contracting.

• Replace a bridge on U.S. 71 over Burke Creek and Cossatot Relief in Sevier County, $10.4 million, Kiewit Infrastructure.

Metro on 08/11/2016

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