State highway officials, finding themselves with a partly finished big bridge south of Reno, are gearing up a nationwide push to find a contractor to finish the job.
The problem: No one has much experience hiring a contractor midway though a construction job, particularly a job as big as the Galena Creek bridge.
The Nevada Department of Transportation this month canceled its $79.5 million contract with Edward Kraemer & Sons, Inc. of Plain, Wisc.
The company had worked more than two years building four bridges that are the cornerstones of the six-lane freeway to be built from Reno to Washoe Valley.
Kraemer completed three of the bridges, but said it didn't believe the Galena Creek bridge 1,719 feet long, 300 feet above the creek can be built safely.
NDOT officials disagree.
Scott Magruder, a spokesman for the transportation agency, says NDOT's engineers believe the structure, which would be among the largest concrete arch bridges in the nation, can be built.
NDOT probably will begin advertising in July for bids to complete the work.
Magruder said the need to seek new bids halfway through a job is highly unusual. It's almost unknown that a contractor would leave a highway job before completion.
"This is a very unique situation," the NDOT spokesman said. "You've got columns up in the air and you're asking another contractor to come in and finish the bridge."
That means, Magruder said, that contractors are likely to have lots of questions as they begin calculating bids to complete the work.
And given the possibility that many builders may shy away from the work, NDOT is gearing up to advertise in publications such as Engineering News Record that reach bridge-building contractors nationwide.
NDOT also may be running tours of the site for interested contractors.
While no one plays down the challenges of finding a replacement contractor, Magruder says NDOT officials have a couple of reasons for optimism.
For one, the time-consuming preliminary work such as creation of access roads and staging areas is completed at the Galena Creek job.
For another, two other companies submitted bids when Edward Kraemer & Sons won the job in 2003 a sign that others in the construction industry believe the bridge can be built.
And some material already is on site.
The next phase of the freeway project, construction of the roadway between the bridges, hinges on NDOT's ability to find a contractor to finish the Galena Creek bridge.
"We're working feverishly to get the next phase out," Magruder says.
The work is scheduled for completion in 2009.
