One of the contractors reconstructing a part of the Vilnius-Utena concrete road built several decades ago should be announced this week, says the head of the Directorate of Motorways of Lithuania. Vitalijs Andrejev says that the price offers of three participants correspond to the amount planned to be spent.
"We have offers, three participants out of six perfectly fit the prices, the others were on the edge. Now their proposals are being evaluated and we will announce the winner soon, during the week," Vitaly Andrejev told BNS last week.
The winner of the tender announced at the beginning of August will have to reconstruct two 4,2 km long sections of the road outside Vilnius - from the 16th kilometer, where the four-lane road ends, to the intersection to Nemenčina at the 21st kilometer.
According to the head of the Road Directorate, it is also planned to announce another tender for the road contract by the end of October.
"The tender for the road is now underway, and by the end of October we intend to announce the purchase of the structures along with the design. Here is the part that was overpriced. We re-prepared the technical specifications, we looked to be able to present cheap, but not the worst offers in terms of quality," said V. Andrejevs.
In July, the Directorate of Roads terminated the tender for the reconstruction of the road section due to excessive prices. Then, taking into account the recommendations of the Public Procurement Service, it was decided to separately announce tenders for the reconstruction of sections and a pair of two-level intersections and two viaducts.
It was then claimed that this would delay the work by several months, and that the new section of the road would be built at the end of 2019.
The results of the first tender, announced at the beginning of the year, were appealed to the Vilnius District Court by the road construction company Eurovia Lietuva, but its claims were rejected at the beginning of October.
According to V. Andrejev, legal disputes have not yet affected the competition.
"The company complained about the old tender and sought to prove that it submitted a good price, and we must recognize it as the winner. She also complained about our incompetence in determining the price, we submitted supporting documents and the court recognized that we acted properly. So far, it has absolutely no (influence on the competition - BNS)," he said.
The Directorate, which previously intended to repair the entire road through a public-private partnership (PPP), abandoned this idea last year and will finance the project from the Road Maintenance and Development Program (KPPP).
The need to renew the Vilnius-Utena road started to be discussed in 2013, in 2014 the Government of Algirdas Butkevičius agreed that it should be implemented by PPP, but Seimas after long discussions, it was approved only at the end of 2015.
It is estimated that the value of the 13-year road construction and maintenance project will reach 170 million. euros. However, the new Government, which took office in December 2016, re-evaluated the project and last May the Ministry of Transport proposed to the Directorate of Roads to reconstruct the road in sections, using KPPP funds.
The maintenance of the road built in 1985, the surface of which is made of cement concrete, is constantly becoming more expensive, because it is cracked, new cracks develop, and the seams are deformed.
