THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 11, 1996 TAG: 9610090157
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 05 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BILL REED, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 58 lines
Hoy Construction of Norfolk is again the apparent low bidder on Oceanfront police and fire station projects that will become part of the Beach Borough public service complex.
A glitch in the initial bidding Sept. 6 prompted city officials to seek a new round of proposals, delaying construction of the two public buildings by about a month.
On the second try, Hoy submitted a construction cost estimate of $4,317,000, a sum $94,000 above its original base bid.
However, said City Engineer John Herzke, the second bid actually produced an $81,000 savings for the city.
The reason: required improvements to 18th Street and construction of a north parking lot were lumped into the second bid request, while they were not in the first.
Initially, competitors were required to bid on the street improvement and parking lot separately as alternates, thus hiking the unit price of the projects by $80,000 or more.
Bids were received last Friday from nine competing firms, said Edward Wall, of the city's Public Works Department engineering office. The highest estimate came in at $4,517,8521.
Eleven contractors answered the first call in September, vying for the right to build the two new service center projects.
In September, Hoy submitted an apparent low base bid of $4.23 million for the job.
A notation on the outside of its bid envelope for a $60,000 addendum drew protests from its nearest competitor, R.D. Lambert & Son of Chesapeake. Lambert had submitted the second low base bid of $4.288 million. The protest prompted city officials to seek new bids.
As envelopes were opened Friday, Hathaway-Duke Construction Co. of Virginia Beach emerged as apparent second-lowest bidder, with a project cost estimate of $4,318,000.
Construction should start in late November, Herzke said, once the bids are reviewed by Public Works Department officials, then forwarded to the City Council for approval.
The new structures - a 19,500-square-foot police station and a 16,000-square-foot fire station - will be built on a seven-acre tract abutting the west side of the year-old Virginia Beach Rescue Squad headquarters, which faces 17th Street.
It will be part of the Beach Borough Services Center, now being assembled between 17th and 18th streets and Cypress and Washington avenues, five blocks from the oceanfront.
The Virginia Beach Volunteer Rescue Squad headquarters already occupies 1.4 acres of city-owned property between 17th and 18th streets. It was completed and occupied in October 1995 at a cost of $1.7 million. The sum does not include the land, which was donated by the city.
The city has been trying since 1989 to replace the city services that now are clustered around the 18th and 19th streets and Arctic Avenue corridor, which borders the Dome property on Pacific Avenue. by CNB