Lift station costs exceed $30 million

While the projected costs of Lift Station 87 have nearly tripled from original estimates, Sarasota city commissioners will decide during a special meeting tonight whether to proceed with the long-delayed wastewater facility.

According to estimates from city contractor McKim & Creed, the project aimed at replacing the aging Lift Station 7 will cost roughly $32 million, which is $21 million more than the failed original design and about $5 million more than McKim & Creed’s previous estimate.

“The cost of the microtunneling has gone up quite a bit,” said city Utilities Director Mitt Tidwell. “Part of that is because we’re going a little bit deeper.”

Geotechnical studies have shown the contractor will have to go as far as 10 feet deeper than originally anticipated, which also means the current work at Luke Wood Park will have to be scrapped. That structure was about 75% complete, Tidwell said.

The city is still entangled in litigation with AECOM Technical Services Inc., which originally designed the project. 

During a Coalition of City Neighborhood Associations meeting Saturday, City Manager Tom Barwin said the city has solid evidence that AECOM "did an awful job" on the design, including the fact that microtunneling using that firm's specifications would have sent a pipe right into the bridge over Hudson Bayou.

"We don't know what we'll get in the court case," Barwin said. "But, we hope to get what we have spent on the court case back."

Other factors driving up the price include plans for a two-story structure to protect the lift station from a category 3 storm surge, replacement of asbestos cement water mains and full roadway restoration, among various new variables.

If commissioners elect to proceed with the project, which will take place in three phases with competition slated for August 2020, Tidwell said there would likely be a microtunneling contractor at work by November.

City staff have recommended a borrowing plan that will defer $1.8 million worth of infrastructure projects until the loan is repaid, but won’t result in relative increases in water or sewer rates.

“I think that’s a good compromise,” Tidwell said.

Click here for more information about the Lift Station 87 project.