Plan for garage put on shelf

Thursday, June 5, 2003 | 8:56 a.m.

City staff has shelved what would have been Las Vegas' first design-build project, a $14.5 million to $16 million parking garage at Third Street between Bonneville and Garces avenues.

On a design-build project, one contractor is given all of the responsibility from design to construction and all of the initial payment for the project. City officials said the approach may work in the future but the need of spending taxpayer money for the garage at this time is questionable.

"We need to pull back and determine whether there really is a need for this garage at this time," Deputy City Manager Steve Houchens said.

"When we first looked at the location, the Molasky Group was planning on building the IRS building at that site. Now we would just be building the garage on speculation to see what would happen. We have decided instead to put this on the shelf for now."

The IRS project now is being built at F Street and Ogden Avenue on the former Union Pacific Railroad yards.

Houchens said that in the five months the proposed 600-space design-build garage project has been in the works "we have gained a lot of educational value for design-build and the basics to do it in the future." He said the garage project may be revisited in six months or a year.

Four companies had applied to be considered for the garage project -- Sletten Construction of Nevada Inc. of Las Vegas; Carpenter Sellers Associates of Las Vegas; the Whiting-Turner Contracting Co. of Las Vegas; and Kracor Inc. of Scottsdale, Ariz.

The design-build approach also would have freed the city from the requirement of awarding the contract to the lowest responsible bidder. Instead, the city could have given more weight to the experience, technical expertise and track records of the bidders. Design-build also provides strong incentives for completing projects on time and under budget because delays would come out of the contractor's pay.

Las Vegas officials earlier this year said they were hoping that a different type of construction contract could help the city avoid construction pitfalls such as the long-delayed Regional Justice Center. The 3-year-old, $185 million justice center is $15 million over budget and county officials estimate the project could require up to two more years to finish.

Design-build wasn't an option for the justice center because the architectural contract was awarded two years before Nevada law was changed to allow design-build.