Costs for Minneapolis light rail exceed $2B | Dump Trucks Charlotte NC

• The Southwest LRT's operating agency and authority, the Metropolitan Council, said the labor shortage, a 17% increase in diesel fuel prices, a 40% rise in steel prices, higher cost of land and an additional $12 million to $16 million in delays due to additional environmental reviews for a $20 million crash protection wall all contributed to the higher projected price. No stations have been cut from the budget in order to compensate for rising costs, but the council did reduce the scope of an operations and maintenance facility for the line.
• Local officials called the cost increases "bumps in the road" and said their other lines have exceeded ridership expectations. The council still must come up with $204 million-plus to cover land acquisitions and a project funding gap. Officials plan to break ground on the project this year – in advance of receiving almost $930 million in anticipated federal funding – and expect the line to be complete in 2023.

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The Metropolitan Council has not disclosed the total cost of the project nor announced an award for the contract. However, earlier this month, general contractor Tutor Perini announced that it was the low bidder for the Southwest LRT project with a price of $800 million. Tutor Perini said it expected to have an executed agreement in hand within 60 days. The company's wholly-owned subsidiary, Lunda Construction, Tutor Perini said, will carry out the columbus oh dump truck company as part of a joint venture.

This is the second round of bidding for the LRT. In a controversial move, the council rejected the first bidders' proposals last September as being too high. Those bids reportedly ranged from $797 million to $1 billion. This latest round of bids, according to the Star Tribune, ranged from $800 million to $812 million.

According to the council, work on the Southwest LRT is expected to generate about 7,500 temporary construction jobs, worth an estimated payroll of $350 million. However, all of the council's lines are helping to create construction jobs through almost $8.5 billion of nearby residential and commercial developments that are either in the planning stages, under construction or already built along existing or planned light-rail lines. Included in that figure is an estimated $1.6 billion worth of projects entering some stage of development this year alone. Announced projects near the future Southwest LRT stations saw an increase of about $500 million since January 2017.