Chicago Transit Authority issued its Final Request for Proposals to three contracting teams pre-selected (in 2017) to design and build Red and Purple modernisation programme, under the first phase. The three pre-selected contracting consortia are Walsh Fluor Design-Build Team, Chicago Rail Constructors and Kiewit Infrastructure Company.
The contracting teams’ proposals will be considered on a variety of criteria, including experience, price and other factors. CTA expects major construction of this project to begin in the second half of 2019. Earlier this spring CTA began pre-construction work that will continue through the rest of this year and into 2019. Pre-construction work includes property demolition and utility relocation work.
The total value of the first phase is USD 2.1 billion and envisages the reconstruction of four of the oldest Red Line stations and 2 km of adjacent track structure and the construction of a rail bypass north of the CTA Belmont station. The bypass will unclog a 100-year-old junction where Red, Purple and Brown Line trains currently intersect allowing CTA to significantly increase the number of trains it can run along the Red Line to reduce overcrowding and meet growing demand for transit service.
“We are well into a comprehensive process to find the most qualified builder to construct this project, which is one of the biggest modernisation projects in CTA history,” CTA President Dorval Carter, Jr said.
The entire RPM plan, to be completed in multiple phases, will rebuild part of CTA’s Red and Purple lines, sections of which are more than a century old. The tracks, structures and stations are well past their useful lifespan, and can no longer handle additional trains to meet the increasing demands of growing ridership – which is up 40 percent during the rush hours since 2008.
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