BATON ROUGE, La. – The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) today met with potential proposers for the design-build project to extend the widening of Interstate 12 to Juban Road. Department officials held the meeting in order to discuss changes to the I-12 request for proposals for the project.
The original deadline to submit a proposal to DOTD was Feb. 9; however, DOTD extended that deadline to March 9 in order to address specific concerns raised by industry about the design-build process. At the request of the proposers at today’s meeting, the deadline has been extended to March 16.
Changes DOTD officials discussed in the meeting include:
• Refining the scoring process by defining how the factors used to score each proposal will be weighted.
• Providing greater specificity in the scope of work.
• Increasing the project’s budget cap from $31 million to $37 million to allow for the expanded scope to widen I-12 in both the eastbound and westbound directions to Juban Road.
• Revealing all proposers’ technical scores to every proposer prior to the public opening of the price proposals.
“I believe these changes will allow the department to secure the best value for the state’s money,” said Sherri LeBas, Interim Secretary of DOTD. “We believe in transparency, and we have taken steps to educate each design-build team about the project scope and the grading process. We received positive feedback in today’s meeting, and we are looking forward to receiving the proposals.”
The department plans to issue the official addendum Friday.