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Change order 56 adds another $390,000 to the cost of construction cost for Rainier Ave Phase 4. This brings the anticipated total cost to $36,449,375 compared to an original budget of $28,284,172, about 29% over. (See the full change order here)
Last night Renton City Council received their 56th change order for the Phase 4 Rainier Avenue improvement project. This change order brings the new anticipated cost up another $390,000, 29% higher than originally budgeted. And the project is only nearing the “pavement complete” stage. Landscaping, signage, and other finishing is still ahead and will undoubtedly bring more changes. (Just last month Council approved a change order hiking the project cost by $3.4 million.)
The contractor submitted the latest $390K change order in response to a section of the original street being about eight inches higher than shown in the engineering drawings, necessitating more material removal and rebuilding of the compact gravel layer before pavement resurfacing could occur. While this specific change order may be reasonable, the total number and cost of change orders on this project should merit some concern by council, and ideally should lead to detailed after-action reviews. Change orders can be caused by many things including schedule delays, contract language, engineering issues, incomplete requirements definition, permitting changes, scope creep, and other issues.
Two-to-three times the number of changes than in previous phase:
For comparison, the Rainier Avenue Phase 3 project was a very similar size and scope to this project, providing the same bus access lanes, upgraded signals and lighting, center median, wider sidewalks, updated water and sewer, joint use utility trench, upgraded signals and new landscape– on a more southerly stretch of Rainier Avenue. But that Phase 3 project ran ahead of schedule and resulted in only 20 change orders at the “pavement complete” stage, just 35% the number of changes seen in Phase 4 to date . The Phase 3 project reached 36 change orders by its conclusion, picking up 16 relatively-minor changes as all the landscaping, signage, Metro Bus provisions, and art installations, and final reconciliation were completed. But even the final number was only 2/3 of the 56 change orders on Phase 4 to date– and again, the phase 4 project has a long ways to go.
The final reconciliation change order on the Phase 3 project brought the contract dollars to 9.5% above the original contract amount, within the originally budgeted 10% contingency. The project was completed about 3 months ahead of schedule.
You can find the list of change orders from Phase 4 here. You can find the complete list of change order from Phase 3 here.
Phase 4 is at least 154 work days behind (about 7-8 months), and motorists have endured continuous lane closures and traffic jams.
Phase 3 finished three months early, and all lanes remained open during most of construction. The Renton Reporter announced the early opening in December 2013 as shown below.
Phase 3 was completed ahead of schedule, (and on budget)
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