Low bid for Silver Ramp corrective work is $2.4M

Brian Johnson
BridgeTower Media Newswires

MINNEAPOLIS — The Metropolitan Airports Commission is looking at a roughly $2.4 million expense to repair the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport’s Silver Ramp, a $240 million structure that opened less than two years ago.

Late Thursday, the MAC opened four contractor bids for the repair project, including the apparent low bid of $2.39 million from Restoration & Construction Services, a Clear Lake, Minnesota-based provider of structural repairs and other services.

Also bidding on the project were Morcon Construction Co. ($2.698 million), Cy-Con Inc. ($2.84 million), and Engineering & Construction Innovations Inc. ($3.09 million).

The 11-level, 5,000-stall Silver Ramp opened in August 2020 after nearly three years of construction. Finance & Commerce reported in 2017 that funding sources included general airport revenue bonds and customer facility charges.

Celebrated by the MAC as a “modern, iconic structure,” the ramp has garnered a number of design and engineering honors.

But a recent “call for bids” from the MAC revealed that the ramp needs “corrective work” to address “spalled and delaminated post-tension concrete beams due to freeze-thaw action from water intrusion” and other issues, as Finance & Commerce reported last week.

Workers will also repair “large surface ponding areas on all elevation levels” of the ramp to “allow water to drain,” according to the call for bids.

The corrective work and bids are expected to be up for discussion Monday at a MAC board committee meeting. A memo to be published in advance of the meeting will have more details about the issues, MAC spokesman Patrick Hogan said in an email.

Last week, Hogan told Finance & Commerce that the MAC is “working with all the firms involved in design and construction to determine who is ultimately responsible for the issues and the cost of corrections. However, we are moving forward with the construction bid now to ensure the repairs can be made during this construction season. Ultimately all the issues we are seeing are repairable.”

Designed by Miller Dunwiddie and built by PCL Construction Services, the Silver Ramp houses car rental customer service counters, a transit center, off-site parking and employee shuttle, secure bicycle facilities, direct connections to the blue Line LRT station and more.

Miller Dunwiddie is “aware there is a call for bids regarding corrective work on the Silver Ramp, however, they do not involve Miller Dunwiddie or our scope of services for the project,” Miller Dunwiddie Marketing Manager Kathy Brady said in an email last week.

Trent Johnson, district manager for PCL’s Minneapolis office, said in an email late last week that PCL is “working directly with MAC project representatives to address any issues.”

This isn’t the first time the project has come under scrutiny.

A 2020 audit addressed delays and found “financial control” deficiencies related to the project, including more than $4 million in “unresolved project costs,” as Finance & Commerce reported.

In general, however, the audit determined that general contractor PCL Construction Services has provided “adequate oversight in the administration and execution of work activities” related to construction of the ramp, according to Metropolitan Airports Commission documents.

Philadelphia-based Talson Solutions conducted the audit in partnership with the MAC. The audit studied construction activity and documentation from November 2017 through January 2020.

“We have followed the contractual obligations we have with the Metropolitan Airports Commission for the construction of the Silver Ramp and we have cooperated fully with the audit of the project,” Michael Headrick, a PCL executive now with the firm’s Los Angeles office, said in 2020.

PCL was awarded a record $229.3 million lump sum contract for the project in October 2017. Since then, $5.5 million worth of change orders and $795,000 of “unit price” additions have increased the contract’s value to $235.6 million, as Finance & Commerce has reported.

Finance & Commerce reported in September 2017 that PCL’s bid was 13% below the MAC’s $262.9 million estimate. The new ramp is between the Red and Blue ramps and the Post Office building at MSP’s Terminal 1.