Bridge project not so complicated in Mat-Su

KNIK — As the Knik Arm Bridge and Toll Authority moves along with plans for a span between Point MacKenzie and Anchorage, all of the heat seems to be on the Anchorage side.

Thursday, concerned residents of Anchorage’s Government Hill neighborhood called a press conference to talk about bridge plan. It’s hard to imagine a similar scenario on the Valley’s side of the bridge.

“We’re fortunate because of where we’re going into, we’re not going into a neighborhood,” said KABATA spokeswoman Shannon McCarthy. “The Mat-Su Borough is the biggest landowner over there (and) we have for a very long time been coordinating with the Mat-Su Borough.”

She said there is one landowner in the path of the bridge on the Point MacKenzie side but even that parcel is what right-of-way experts usually call a “partial take” in that KABATA won’t have to buy the whole thing.

McCarthy said things are much more complicated in Anchorage.

“It sure is because there’s a few more landowners involved and we are talking about structures,” that will be impacted by bridge construction, she said. “We always try to minimize that whenever possible and the engineers did do that in this case. They’re actually doing a cut-and-cover tunnel so you won’t be able to see the road from the Government Hill neighborhood.”

Also in port news — on Thursday, KABATA issued a press release detailing the results of its request for Statements of Qualifications.

Statements of Qualifications, or SOQs, are one of the most preliminary steps of the bridge-building process. Essentially, “development groups” — teams of companies — hoping to bid on the bridge project let KABATA take a look at their ability to do the work.

KABATA says that it got six such statements and the lists of companies involved on the various teams runs into the dozens. Interested companies are from Europe, Australia, Asia and North America.

“These development groups or consortiums cover all aspects of the project — and include equity investors, engineering firms, construction companies, maintenance organizations and concessionaires. This sends the message that Alaska is open for business.” Michael Foster, KABATA Board Chair, said in a press release.

KABATA plans to narrow that list of six SOQs down to three and accept bids from those.

The winning consortium will finance, design, build, operate and maintain the bridge and would recoup its costs from bridge tolls.

Lately the state Legislature has tried to decide what to do about Wasilla Sen. Linda Menard’s proposal to set up a fund to cover and shortfalls between tolls and operating costs. Menard’s proposal will be back in front of them when the legislative session resumes in January 2012.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.