YORK COUNTY, Pa. — PennDOT first issued notice to the contractor of the Mount Rose construction project to proceed back on April 20, 2015.
Now in 2021, May 11 was set to be the completion date for the project.
Yet again, it appears the project is still not complete, creating another delay.
According to David Thompson, the District Press Officer for PennDOT, here is what remains to be completed in the project:
- Re-open both ramps on North side of Mount Rose Avenue (There is a planned traffic switch scheduled for tonight that will reopen these ramps).
- Complete final pavement surface course over the entire project.
- Final pavement markings
- Install permanent signs
- Traffic signal components
- Punchlist items of work
There is no new target date for completion.
Residents who frequently drive the area said they were frustrated with the lack of progress.
“Almost an accident every time that you come across. You can’t see across the hill, so it’s kind of dangerous,” said Dennis Hicks of Hanover.
“It’s a pain because the road’s all bumpy and they need to pave stuff. It’s just terrible it took so long,” said Felton resident William O’Hearn. “Come on. How long is this going to take?”
“Every time I come here, I’m sitting in traffic,” said Kody Keahtigh of York.
Pa. Senator Kristin Phillips-Hill has been outspoken about the project's delays in the past, and issued a statement on Tuesday.
“When families all across York County gather to celebrate graduations in the next several weeks, their children will have gone through high school or college in a shorter timeframe than it took this contractor to update this interchange along Interstate 83,” Phillips-Hill said.
“A short 14-mile drive down I-83 shows a completely different story where a Pennsylvania-based contractor is on-time and on-budget for the Shrewsbury Interchange project.”
Now, Phillips-Hill is unveiling legislation that would attempt to prohibit the practices used by the Mt. Rose Interchange contractor in other Pennsylvania Highway construction projects.
The bill would require the state agency in charge of the procurement to take into consideration well-documented instances of “change order scheming” from out-of-state companies.
"A company will come in, bring in a very low bid, undercut all the other bidders, and then on the back end, put in change orders that actually cause the total cost of that project to go way higher," Phillips-Hill said.
Phillips-Hill said Cherry Hill Construction parent company Tutor Perini has several well-documented instances of the same practice used in other states.
Tutor Perini released a statement:
Change orders on large construction projects are very common and not unique to projects involving Cherry Hill Construction (CHC) and PennDOT. In fact, terms and procedures that specifically address the management of change orders are included in every construction contract let by PennDOT. Most change orders result from owner-provided designs and field changes to those designs. Owners find that they must correct deficiencies in owner-provided designs, correct the designs of structures which are not constructible as designed, or re-design because of differing site conditions. In addition, some projects are poorly managed by the owner due to less-competent supervisory staff assigned and a lack of adequate communication and/or decision-making by the owner’s staff in the field or home office. All of this can result in significant delays and costly extra work as the contractor awaits resolution of critical path directions. The I-83/Mt. Rose project is such an example. CHC has actively performed extra work on the project (resulting in delays) arising from PennDOT’s decisions to undercut below plan elevation at critical structures, from PennDOT’s untimely decisions to undertake “jack and bore” operations under I-83, and from PennDOT’s decisions to remove unexpected unsuitable materials encountered in excavation. The PennDOT contract method to address the time delay and the increased costs to CHC is through a claim hearing before the Board of Claims, which is exactly what CHC is pursuing. In addition, at the Board, CHC will be given the opportunity to challenge PennDOT’s improper assessment of liquidated damages. The Board claim is proceeding and has not yet been heard by the Board; nevertheless, CHC continues to progress the job to completion. However, PennDOT has recently failed to provide a systematic review of multiple pavement grade submittal packages provided by CHC to PennDOT on April 3, 2021. This is one of many delays that cannot be charged to CHC. CHC is progressing this project as expeditiously as possible.
The contractor filed a claim in 2019 seeking an additional $24 million for the project. That litigation is ongoing.
According to the statement, Phillips-Hill knows that the lowest responsible bidder is critical to stretching limited taxpayer dollars to the maximum, but the key is how responsible they have been in the past.
In the case of the Mt. Rose Interchange project, the initial project was quoted at $58.3 million.
To date, the project exceeds $62 million based on reports from last October. Phillips-Hill said the cost overruns coupled with the fact that the deadline has been missed by as many years now as the original proposal stated.
“The people of York County have every right to be frustrated. If this was a contractor putting in a new bathroom at your home, you would never tolerate a construction crew doubling the timeframe and adding 10 percent of costs to the project you were initially quoted. This project needs to be completed and moving forward, we should not do business with entities that have a track record of doing what we have all witnessed over the last six years,” she added.
Work is continuing with a planned lane restriction May 11 at the I-83 South exit 18 to Mount Rose Ave. The work is scheduled from 9 p.m. May 11 to 6 a.m. May 12.