What are the Reasons Given for the Delay in Completion of the 9-Mile Road 4-Lane Project?

The segment of the 9-mile road project in Beulah between exit 5 and Beulah Road is more than 24 months behind schedule and $6.5 Million over budget.  Apparently, I'm not supposed to be upset about this though---even as I see bright sunny 3-day weekends go by where no work is being done on the site....

Yesterday morning at the Florida Alabama Transportation Planning Organization Meeting I was able to ask representatives of the Florida Department of Transportation about the agonizingly slow progress on completing the 4-lane upgrade of 9-Mile Road in Beulah.

Folks out here that I represent are angry.  And that is putting it politely.

Citizens subjected to this agonizingly slow project and road intersections that are so out of level it is damaging vehicles are fed up.  They are coming to me with angry complaints--but I'm hearing now that I am "coming on too strong" by blogging about this and putting FDOT on the defensive.

My constituents don't care though.  They want answers!

They want to know what I want to know:  Why is this project so badly behind schedule and over budget?

I asked, and here are the initial answers given by FDOT representatives at the TPO in Gulf Breeze yesterday.  These FDOT folks were present and knew my questions would be coming due to media coverage of my blog post from Monday on this topic.

Bryant Paulk, of FDOT, described four major issues/changes that the contractor has been awarded on this segment of the project which have led to the completion deadline slipping.  I have requested, through the executive director of the TPO Austin Mount, to meet with the new FDOT District 3 Director as soon as possible to discuss these issues and get more specific details, and that meeting will take place sometime within the next few weeks I am told.

So here's what's going on according to FDOT yesterday---four major contract change orders, over 1000 additional contract days, have been awarded by FDOT to their contractor on this job:

1.) Change order one was for more and larger noise walls along the side of the project adjacent to Nature Trail Subdivision, at an additional cost of $400K via an addition of 110 contract completion days.

2.) Due to the increase in traffic on the corridor--the contractor was awarded a $2.3 Million Dollar change order and an additional 325 days for completion

3.) To speed up just the first portion of this segment to have the 4-lanes complete between exit 5 and NFCU way--an acceleration award to the contractor was made in the amount of $1.4 Million

4.)  Cistern Leaching over a section of the segment resulted in additional contract completion days and a $1.1 Million dollar addition to the contract.

According to Mr. Paulk--a total of 1,089 additional contract completion days have been added to the contract since it was commenced in 2016.  During the discussion, Mr. Paulk indicated that the initial completion was slated for late 2018---before the addition of the additional contract days for weather and holidays.  He stated that the project is now expected to be completed by May of 2021 and as of right now it is $6.5 Million over budget.

So in my meeting that will be scheduled soon, I will request much more information on these delays and the specifics of the change orders, and I will post what I learn here.

Look--I get it. FDOT is not happy this is over budget and behind schedule.  They want it done ASAP just as we do--just as I do.

The difference is--they are comfortably distanced away from this project unlike me and my constituents who have to navigate this nightmare multiple times daily.  And they also seem quite happy to defend the reasons why this is so badly behind and even seamlessly double-down on how these delays and cost-overages are "normal" and just "part of doing business."  

That's where our agreement ends. This project is an absolute, unmitigated disaster.  

So  I'll be asking for the information and rationale for why they feel this project and these cost overruns and delays are acceptable--because I think it is unacceptable and most of my constituents do as well.