Low bid $29 million for I-40 project

Interstate 40 into and out of West Memphis is slowly undergoing extensive maintenance. Again.

The Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department on Wednesday opened a low bid of $29.7 million to resurface a 16.4-mile section west from Shearerville in St. Francis County and rebuild one bridge. Roughly the same section was resurfaced in 2003 at a cost of $10.6 million.

The project is the fifth in recent years to focus on the area. Together the projects account for $154 million worth of work. That section of I-40 leads into the Interstate 55 interchange and is a major freight corridor.

Of the 40,000 vehicles that travel that route daily, more than half are tractor-trailer rigs, according to department data.

The department expects APAC-Tennessee Inc. of Memphis to wrap up its work later this year on a $38.5 million project that began almost two years ago from Shearerville east to Arkansas 77 in Crittenden County. That work included constructing two bridges, repairing the northbound ramp to Interstate 55, resurfacing a 13-mile section of I-40 and installing a wire rope safety fence.

In 2004, a $42.6 million contract was awarded to rebuild that same section.

The Highway Department also is rebuilding three bridges on I-40, all in St. Francis County.

James Construction Group LLC of Baton Rouge is replacing the I-40 bridge over Shell Lake at a cost of $33.2 million, and is building a new bridge over Black Fish Lake at a cost of $26.9 million. Manhattan Road and Bridge Co. of Naples, Fla., has a $26.7 million contract to replace the I-40 bridge over Fishing Lake.

Work on the three bridges should be close to completion by the time the latest project ramps up, Straessle said.

The project involves resurfacing 14 bridges — seven in each direction — in addition to pavement resurfacing, which isn’t as expensive or as involved as total reconstruction and will take about 10 months to complete, Straessle said. The project was one of 72 totaling $78.5 million for which bids were opened Wednesday.

It is part of a larger effort to maintain the state’s interstate system. Eighty-two other planned projects will cover 494 miles of interstate being resurfaced or rebuilt under the department’s $1.2 billion interstate rehabilitation program. Arkansas has about 600 miles of interstate.

Voters approved a measure in 2011 to reissue up to $575 million in bonds to be leveraged with other state and federal transportation money to pay for the program.