Roadbridge and Sisk Doing Well

Sponge Bob

Anywhere but Ireland. Our top road building crew have a few years of work in Poland and are onsite there since last august.

http://www.sisk.ie/sisk/sisk/www/default.asp?magpage=28&id=438&wid=2

Project 1
The construction of A1 Motorway Toruñ-Stryków Section I: Czerniewice–Odolion, from km 151+900 to km 163+300 and Section II: Odolion–Brzezie, from km 163+300 to km 186+366. The new sections of the A1(from km 151+900 to km 186+366) will start at “Czerniewice” interchange and travel south for 34,466km. Local partner on this project is PBG.
Start Date: July 2010 Completion: Autumn 2012
Value: €187.5 million


Project 2
The construction of A1 Motorway Toruñ-Stryków Section III: Brzezie-Kowal from km 186+348 to km 215+850. The new section of the A1(from km 186+348 to km 215+850) will start at “Brzezie” interchange and travel south for 29.5km to the “Kowal” interchange. Local partner on this project is PBG.
Start Date: July 2010 Completion: Autumn 2012
Value: €172 million


Project 3
The construction of A1 Motorway Toruñ-Stryków from km 215+850 to km 245+800 junction Kowal-junction Sójki. The scheme A1 Kowal to Sójki will be 29.95km of dual carriageway. Local Partner on this project is Budbaum.
Start Date: August 2010 Completion: April 2012
Value: €161 million

Maps.


http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/7610/orientacjaodc1212500008.jpg
http://img832.imageshack.us/img832/124/orientacjaodc3412500008.jpg

As we always enjoyed watching the pros at work I refer you to THIS THREAD on Skyscraper City for the updates starting from around page 123 when they went on site.

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=389562&page=123

Overall map



And Wiki Page for the whole motorway, in English. Roadbridge Bitches welcome to say nice things about them in the wiki.

Sponge Bob

The Poles don't fanny around. If you are too slow they will cancel your contract. I wouldn't worry if I were Roadbridge though. This section was in the mountains near the Czech border.

http://biznes.onet.pl/gddkia-zrywa-umowe-na-budowe-trasy-a1,18490,3090006,1,news-detal

General Directorate of Roads and Highways withdraws from the contract for the construction of the A1 motorway from Świerklany to the border with the Czech Republic in Gorzyczki. As said spokesman Martin Hadaj GDDKiA, the reason to withdraw from the contract is too small advancement of the construction work. In April 2010, will be announced a new tender for the construction of this section and will be ready for EURO 2012 - provides GDDKiA.

The contract for the construction of the toll motorway Świerklany-Gorzyczki was signed on 18 October 2007 and a consortium between GDDKiA Alpine Bau GmbH. As indicated by the Directorate, the progress of work on this section should now reach 85 percent., Meanwhile, is just 50 percent. Blame for the delay in the work GDDKiA blame only the works contractor. At the same time ensure that the motorway will be finished before the start of the UEFA European Football Championship in 2012

As explained GDDKiA repealed the notorious consortium from carrying out works under the contract, during the work have also been to numerous delays. Despite repeated calls from the Directorate-contractor has not submitted a timetable to accelerate the work. According to the Directorate Alpine Bau GmbH was not able to provide the necessary engineering staff, and boasted the fifth month of work is only 69 manual workers, although, according GDDKiA should be their hundreds. Workers do not przepracowywali the required number of hours per day, had no authority to operate the equipment, which used - says GDDKiA.

From December 15 the stretch of motorway A1 Świerklany-Gorzyczki Inventory Committee started its work.

Another contract for the construction of this highway section is to be signed with the winners of the tender company to develop a new project, using the work done so far by Alpine Bau GmbH. The invitation to tender is planned for April 2010 and signed a contract in August 2010, so that the work completed by 31 March 2012

Work on the stretch of the A1 motorway from the Gorzyczki Świerklany began in 2007 and was completed in 2010 during the construction site was discovered unexploded ordnance, which resulted in postponing the completion of construction until August 2010, but after 4 months of late work in relation the schedule was 40 percent. A month later increased to 60 percent.

The contract value amounted to 273 million euros. As reported GDDKiA in connection with the withdrawal, the fault of the contractor, Alpine Bau GmbH, the consortium will pay a contractual penalty of 15 percent. contract value. This will be the amount of approximately EUR 40 million.

As reported RMF FM, this is the first ever case of breach of contract for the construction of the highway by GDDKiA.

Amtmann

Delighted to see Roadbridge in particular doing well. People who gripe about "foreign companies" getting Irish contracts should be directed to this thread.

Sponge Bob

The Poles intend to complete 1000km of Motorway in 2012 alone.....not all in time for Euro 2012 as intended.

This thread below on skyscrapercity has stats ....LOTS of stats...LOTS of updated Maps. Motoway = Autostrada and HQDC/2+2 = Expressway or Droga Expresowa.

Start at post 3700 which is recent

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=74567515&postcount=3700

Sponge Bob

This went pear shaped for Sisk who claim to be owed €250m by the Polish government who urfed them off a contract in 2012

http://www.independent.ie/business/world/sisk-family-give-company-cash-injection-after-losses-on-unpaid-work-29119019.html

and

http://www.irishexaminer.com/archives/2012/0914/business/sisk-to-sue-poland-over-road-project-207567.html

In 2010, Sisk — through its 50:50 joint venture with Roadbridge, called SRB — tendered for and won three contracts from the Polish roads authority, the GDDKiA. Of these three projects, SRB completed one motorway last week, but it has abandoned the other two motorways, which are partially completed.
In 2010, the GDDKiA awarded SRB three separate motorway projects, each about 30km, which included 88 bridges and 4 toll plazas. SRB signed a build-only contract, which meant the Irish firm was responsible solely for the motorway construction.

Other build only contracts in Poland have been abandoned as well and the plan to connect Warsaw to Germany by motorway in time for the Euros in 2012 is frankly in tatters. The Polish NRA ( the GDDKiA) even toed some Austrians named Alpine Bau) off a slow job down south, retendered and the same Austrians won it again. That is not complete either.

Furthermore the EU is not overly happy with governance in the GDDKiA

http://euobserver.com/economic/118897

30.01.13

It took the decision after the Polish prosecutor accused 11 people - 10 of them CEOs of large construction firms and one of them a former director in Poland's road agency, the GDDKiA - of colluding to fix prices for tenders for EU-co-funded projects.
The frozen money concerns €4 billion of unspent Polish allocations from the EU's 2007 to 2013 budget in the "infrastructure & environment" programme.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/04/eu-poland-fraud-idUSL5N0B17QO20130204

The firms whose current or former executives have been charged include some of Europe's biggest builders or their subsidiaries: Austria's Strabag, Portugal's Mota Engil , and units of Spain's Ferrovial, and France's Bouygues Construction and Vinci.

However those allegations do not concern any contract or bidding process involving Sisk or Roadbridge nor their Polish partner PBG but PBG have gone into examinership or something similar in account of the cashflow hassle and overruns.

Personally I have no idea whether Sisk Roadbridge or their JV will succeed or when but I suspect that very few new motorway contracts will issue in Poland over the next 3-4 years while they sort the legacy mess out ......even the Chinese find Poland and its procurement processes to be rather opaque and the same Chinese couldn't count it seems.

http://www.presseurop.eu/en/content/article/716731-motorway-china-couldnt-build

Againsat all that it must be said that the Polish Motorway program ( their Motorways are better than ours ) and expressways ( between 2+2 and Rural HQDC standard) is a very large program ( biggest road program in the EU in recent years ) and very rushed...cranking up 6 years ago...and unsurprisingly they ran into a haste vs speed crunch.

Geogregor

Just one slight correction.
Warsaw was connected to Germany before Euro 2012. They managed to do it with only few days to spare, and the final wearing layer had to be laid after the tournament, but Warsaw and Berlin are connected by motorway.
Obviously it is shame it took as 20 years since communism collapse but it is done.
Situation with the Irish (and not only Irish) contractors who burn themselves on the Polish road contracts is complicated. There is ongoing discussion on Polish forums about management (or mismanagement) of the road projects in Poland. In my opinion our road authority as well as contractors are both partially guilty of the mess we ended up with.
For example the story of the Alpina and their second contract for the same stretch of motorway is still ongoing. There is problem with one of the bridges. Road authority blames contarctor, contractor blames design of the bridge and we, poor drivers, are still waiting (I come from the city nearest to this stupid bridge). It must be about 4 years now and still no sign of finishing this damn bridge.

Comparing to that your problems with the Bog of Doom on M7 were nothing

Sponge Bob

Geogregor wrote: »

Situation with the Irish (and not only Irish) contractors who burn themselves on the Polish road contracts is complicated. There is ongoing discussion on Polish forums about management (or mismanagement) of the road projects in Poland. In my opinion our road authority as well as contractors are both partially guilty of the mess we ended up with.

I hear some of the geotechnical data is not up to scratch...and that some foreign contractors realised when they got onsite that there was no stone to be had anywhere for 100s of km and no motorway to truck it in on ...ohhh ummmmmm oops!!!.

In terms of scale the Polish effort since about 2005 is enormous..no other EU country was building and supervising and contracting anywhere near the Polish scale in the late 2000s....bar Spain perhaps and I think that effort is supervised by the 11 Regions not by one single body like the NRA or GDDKiA

Comparing to that your problems with the Bog of Doom on M7 were nothing

The Bog of Doom hasn't gone away you know, it is gurgling away quietly down there.

I really have no idea what is going on on the Czech border except that there is a motorway built on the Czech side to connect to.

I never heard of a contractor being reawarded a tender for a job they already got thrown off for non compliance though, when are they due to get the boot the second time round??

Geogregor

Sponge Bob wrote: »

I really have no idea what is going on on the Czech border except that there is a motorway built on the Czech side to connect to.

I never heard of a contractor being reawarded a tender for a job they already got thrown off for non compliance though, when are they due to get the boot the second time round??

This is complete shamble. They decided to go for unique so called "signature design" bridge. There were problems with this bridge almost from the start of the construction. Alpina was claiming that the design wasn't up to the standards required. Polish Road Authority claimed that everything was fine. At the end they kicked them out for the delays. To be honest Alpina had massive delays not only on the bridge, they really struggled with the contract.

What happened next is truly bizarre. Different Alpina (one of the sister companies or something like that) won the contract again. At the same time original Alpina is suing Polish Road Authority for being kicked out from the original contract. So there are voices saying that they really are trying to find design flaws rather to finish the job, purely to find ammunition for their lawsuit.

Anyway last year during the construction there were some elements of the bridge breaking during tensing of the cables so construction was halted on the safety grounds. Tones of conflicting analyses were produced by different experts. At the moments bridge is redesigned with extra external tension cables being added as well as redesign of other elements. No one knows what will happen next, construction is technically ongoing with some works inside the bridge structure which unfortunately are invisible to forumers.

BTW what is happening with the Bog of Doom? Is the motorway still sinking?
Who was the contractor. Sisk? Roadbridge? Or someone else?

Sponge Bob

Geogregor wrote: »

BTW what is happening with the Bog of Doom? Is the motorway still sinking?
Who was the contractor. Sisk? Roadbridge? Or someone else?

Stable for now, it was built by Bernard McNamara and Moto Engil and Coffey and the Geotechnical 'advice' came from London I think.

Moto Engil have built roads in Poland too. Bernard is in NAMA for €1bn +

http://mota-engil-ce.eu/projects-list/project/construction-of-an-express-road-s7-section-skarzysko-kamienna-wystepa-16

kravmaga

All is not well with the Poilish Roads Authority, according to the article recently in the Irish Times.

Difficult to work with, making decisions , corruption , cancelling contracts etc.

Red tape and bureauracy is rooted deeply in the GDDkia monolith.

The Polish Roads Authority were not happy with the Chinese contracting companies, so cancelled their contracts, Irish companies tendered and won contracts, then cancelled, its going to teh European Court now, what a disaster.

Poles are difficult people by nature me thinks, have been to different regions and everything is an issue, people appear to be very sad and broken, not get up and go....

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/sectors/commercial-property/road-works-in-poland-lead-to-dead-end-for-siac-and-sisk-1.1572124

Geogregor

kravmaga wrote: »

Poles are difficult people by nature me thinks, have been to different regions and everything is an issue, people appear to be very sad and broken, not get up and go....

This is broad and unjust generalization.
It is like saying that all Irish are lazy drunkards

Having said that, there are many problems with Polish road projects.
But it is not usually caused by outright corruption, there are few other, more complicated issues.
For example some contractors put too low bids hoping to get more money for all sorts of "extra works" agreed after signing contracts. However GDDKiA is bound by very strict anti corruption laws and couldn't/wouldn't do it.

On the other hand GDDKiA is slow and unresponsive, there is fear of making any significant decision by anyone apart from top brass. Basically "cover your ass and do as little as possible" philosophy rules this institution. It is always contractor's fault. So if there is claim for genuine extra works or unforeseen situations or even mistakes in designs it takes months to get any agreement for change or extra fees.

There is also dodgy business of supporting some nearly collapsed Polish contractors like Polimex where state enterprises got some stakes. They do few projects with huge (I mean multi-year) delays and they are treated very favorable.

I wonder how it will all pan out when EU looks closer.

Victor

kravmaga wrote: »

Poles are difficult people by nature me thinks, have been to different regions and everything is an issue, people appear to be very sad and broken, not get up and go....

It is one thing to say an organisation or its officials are difficult, other thing to label 40 million people.

Moderator

Lurching

Geogregor wrote: »

For example some contractors put too low bids hoping to get more money for all sorts of "extra works" agreed after signing contracts. However GDDKiA is bound by very strict anti corruption laws and couldn't/wouldn't do it.

That alone is not enough reason to cancel contracts. That's how projects are won the world over. If a Contractor decides themselves to lead with a low price, it's their risk whether or not variations will be accepted.

spacetweek

Only seeing this thread now, sad seeing the optimistic start and then how it ended up.
The pace of road building apart from the A1 in Poland still seems to be high, though - 604 km last year.

kravmaga

I am just back from Warsaw after a week, no outer orbital motorway?
What a shame.

I used the tram system which was quite effective to get around the city.

C.B.A. arrested 20 officials for corruption in outsourcing allocation of IT government contracts. Warsaw Business Journal.

Wish our government would follow suite and lock up some of our white collar crims.