Engineering News-Record (ENR) Southwest selected Valley Metro’s Gilbert Road Light Rail extension as the best project in its highway/bridges category. ENR is the construction industry’s principal trade publication.
“Our team, along with our partner Stacy and Witbeck, are very proud of this achievement,” said Chris Elison, Project Manager for Sundt’s Transportation Group. “Being able to expand Valley Metro’s capacity and being acknowledged for the work is very rewarding.”
The construction manager at risk project added 1.9 miles to the existing 26-mile Valley Metro rail system. The work included adding two new stations and expanding the light rail on Main Street in Mesa from just east of Mesa Drive to Gilbert Road. Public art installations were added at the new stations and the Main Street and Gilbert Road station’s park-and-ride facility.
During the three-year project, nearly 910,000 pounds of rebar were put in the track slab, over 650 tons of rail installed and over 9,000 cubic yards of concrete poured in the track slab. Additional work on the project included utility relocation, overhead power conversion to underground duct bank, drainage improvements and landscape work.
Sundt and joint-venture partner Stacy and Witbeck have played a leading role in building the Valley Metro Rail system for greater metro Phoenix. Since 2004 the team has built a maintenance and operations facility, more than half of the initial 20-mile light rail track, line sections 4 and 5, and the Northwest Phoenix extension, all winners of national industry awards.
