Hoffman, Rock Road joint venture only bidder for $127M I-39 project

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The road builder Hoffman Construction has joined forces with a competitor to reel in a nearly $127 million highway project in the state’s December letting.

The Black River Falls company formed a joint venture named I-39 Constructors with Janesville-based Rock Road Companies to submit a $126.6 million bid to rebuild a stretch of Interstate 39 in Rock County, said James Hoffman, president of Hoffman Construction. The company was the lone bidder for the project, according to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.

Separately in the December letting, Hoffman out-bid two rival companies to win a $57.5 million contract for work on Wisconsin Highway 128 between Hudson and Menomonie.

As for the work on Interstate 39, the contract calls for expanding a 13-mile stretch of the interstate from County Highway O, south of Janesville, to the Dane County line. The roadway will have eight lanes from County O to the Wisconsin Highway 26 interchange and six lanes from there to the county line. Hoffman said he expects the work to get underway this spring.

The project will constitute the central section called for in a four-phase plan to rebuild Interstate 39/90 from the Illinois border to Madison.

During a campaign event in Milton in September, former Gov. Scott Walker had said work on the central section would wrap up in 2020, a year earlier than initially planned, freeing up $70 million for other parts of the project. Additional phases of the same project call for a $90 million overhaul of the U.S. highway 12/18 beltline interchange in Madison.

As for Hoffman’s low bid as a standalone company in the December letting, that won it a contract to rebuild part of Interstate 94 in Dunn County between Menomonie and Hudson. Also competing for that job were the Princeton road builder Mashuda Contractors, which offered $60.7 million, and the Medford company James Peterson and Sons, which offered $62.7 million. Follow @natebeck9