Skanska Clinches $303M Massachusetts Bridge Replacement Job

Skanska introduced June 11 a $303-million contract awarded by the Massachusetts Dept. of Transportation to interchange the Rourke Bridge north of Boston that has exceeded its helpful design life.

“The reconstruction of the brand new Rourke Bridge will additional help the deliberate development on this area to accommodate future site visitors demand and can enhance the general security and operational effectivity at this crossing of the Merrimack River,” stated Paul Pedini, senior vice chairman of operations at Skanska USA Civil in a press release.

The Rourke Bridge, a critical transportation span over the Merrimack River in Lowell, Mass., carries about 27,000 automobiles per day, in accordance with MassDOT. Inbuilt 1983 as a brief bridge, the bridge’s car capability is insufficient, and it doesn’t adjust to present multi-modal ADA requirements for bicycle and pedestrian options.

“One of the vital vital challenges [for the design-build project] shall be establishing the brand new bridge over the Merrimack River, with a lot of the work carried out from barges,” Rob Pine, Skanska vice chairman of operations in Waltham, Mass. stated in an e-mail. “Working in an energetic river atmosphere requires cautious planning to guard the waterway whereas preserving the challenge on schedule and guaranteeing the security of our staff and the general public.”

Development to interchange the Rourke Bridge started in Could and the challenge is “anticipated to realize full useful use with the brand new bridge open to full capability for all modes of transportation in 2029,” MassDOT spokesman John Goggin stated in an e-mail.

The prevailing bridge will stay open to be used till completion of the substitute construction. As soon as the brand new bridge opens, the prevailing bridge shall be demolished.

Designed for a 75-year service life, the substitute bridge shall be a seven-span construction with seven steel-plate girders per span. The challenge additionally contains intersection reconstruction at each ends of the bridge, bicycle and pedestrian options, stormwater infrastructure enhancements, freeway lighting, landscaping and utility relocations.

“It’ll present expanded capability, energy, sturdiness and aesthetic options that can serve the Lowell group and the encompassing area for many years to return,” Pine says.

Since MassDOT has acquired essential permits for the bridge design and building, Skanska will proceed “guaranteeing full compliance with the permits and defending the environmentally delicate areas as we design and construct the bridge,” Pine says.

About 80% of the tasks funding is federal with nearly all of the opposite 20% coming from state funding. The challenge may also obtain about $3.6 million in native funding, Goggin says.

Because the challenge has acquired federal funding below the Construct America Purchase America Act, Pine says dangers related to “shifting tariff insurance policies” of the Trump Administration must be diminished.

MassDOT’s choice to interchange the bridge was based mostly on a examine and feasibility evaluation of the bridge and surrounding streets that was performed in 2013, the company web site notes.