The Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) has announced the selection of Ames Construction Inc. of Burnsville, Minn., as the Winona Bridge construction manager general contractor (CMGC) contracting team.
The Winona Bridge project is the first MnDOT project to use the CMGC procurement method.
With CMGC, a contracting team is hired—in this case Ames Construction Inc.—during the design phase to aid in estimating costs, assessing project risks, reviewing construction staging and maintenance of traffic, and tailoring the final design toward the most cost-effective contractor means and methods.
“The selection of the contracting team was based on a best-value process that includes evaluation of the contractor’s background and experience with projects similar to the Winona project,” said Terry Ward, MnDOT project manager.
“I’m excited to be working with Ames on MnDOT’s first CMGC project. Their past experience working on ROC 52 in Rochester and current work on the Dresbach Bridge and St. Croix River Crossing will be helpful as we move forward with this new procurement method,” Ward said.
When the project is ready for construction, Ames Construction will competitively bid the construction work against a series of cost estimates. The final pricing they come up with is required to be within 10% of a blind independent cost estimate. This differs from the traditional low-bid project delivery system used to deliver MnDOT construction projects, where the bidding is open to multiple contractors.
CMGC has been used by other state departments of transportation across the country, including Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Oregon and Utah. Its use is growing in the transportation sector as a means to maximize constrained budgets and benefit from early involvement of the contractor during the design phase. CMGC is one of the Federal Highway Administration’s 13 Every Day Counts initiatives, specifically designed to accelerate the use of innovative practices.
For additional information about the project, go to www.mndot.gov/winonabridge/index.html.
