Section 5 of Interstate 69 won’t be finished until at least summer 2017, nearly eight months after the original expected completion date.
Until this point, officials with I-69 Development Partners said they expected the project to be finished by October 2016. Now, the project isn’t expected to be completed until June 28, 2017, according to an email from Will Wingfield, Indiana Department of Transportation spokesman.
The state department of transportation hired I-69 Development Partners, a private development team, to design, build and finance the cost of converting the 21-mile stretch of Ind. 37 between Bloomington and Martinsville into Interstate 69. Once it is completed, I-69 Development Partners will maintain that stretch of interstate for the next 35 years.
Wingfield said in a phone interview Tuesday evening that the delay in the work will not affect the cost of the project for taxpayers. The agreement calls for the state to pay I-69 Development Partners a fixed rate of about $22 million for each of those 35 years of maintenance.
Wingfield referred questions about the cause of the delay to officials with I-69 Development Partners. Multiple attempts to speak with I-69 Development Partners’ media relations contact Tuesday about the delay were unsuccessful.
However, last week, an official with I-69 Development Partners said disputes between the design-build contractor and its subcontractors halted some work on the project.
I-69 Development Partners hired Isolux Corsan as its design-build contractor. Isolux then hired subcontractors to carry out the actual construction.
Gary Vandegriff, operations and maintenance manager with I-69 Development Partners, said last week the contract issues began sometime within the past 30 days, but he would not provide details of the conflict, saying it was between Isolux and its subcontractors.
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