central artery big dig

Dec 31 2007 marks the end of the terminally inept Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff project management joint venture at the Massachusetts Turnpike's Big Dig project. How such stellar companies could mismanage construction so totally is difficult to explain except in terms of the Turnpike's perverse structuring of the incentives - the send-us-the-bills-whatever deal which meant that the more B/PB screwed up the more they earned.

A company supplying 'off' concrete to the Massachusetts Turnpike's Big Dig is settling with the state of Massachusetts and the US for up to $125m but six fired staff are being prosecuted individually for criminal conspiracy and fraud.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NSTB) highlights poor anchor specification by design engineers of Gannett Fleming and project managers Bechtel Parsons Brinckerhoff joint venture (Bechtel/PB) as the cause of the ceiling collapse that killed a car passenger July 10, 2006 and resulted in some tens of millions of dollars of costs in traffic disruption, lost tolls and rebuilding of the suspended ceilings.

The main I-93 "Thomas O'Neill" Tunnel of the Big Dig in Boston is leaking about fifty times the contracted limit for water seepage and the volumes are going up - the Boston Post reports today.

An average 50 gallons per hour (190L/hr) is the limit specified in contract documents for the allowed leakage in the 2400m (1.5mi) long tunnel constructed by cut and cover under the streets of central Boston.