Tag: INDOT

INDOT’s First CMGC Project

Posted on by Dan Osborn

On April 8, INDOT posted on its website a draft request for proposals for the US 31 and I-465 Interchange Modification Project. This is INDOT’s first use of the Construction Manager/General Contractor (CMGC) progressive project delivery method. CMGC, along with Progressive Design-Build (PDB), were included in the 2023 Indiana House Enrolled Act 1049. The Indiana legislature passed House Enrolled Act 1196 in 2014 allowing Construction Manager as Constructor (CMc) for state education institutions. House Bill 1196 added that other public agencies could begin using CMc in 2017 except for highway construction contracts. The 2023 law makes INDOT work the last public construction area to embrace this new contracting method.

CMGC and PDB both revolve around two-phase project delivery. In both methods, an owner contracts with a contractor (CMGC) or contractor-designer team (PDB) for the first phase to provide and/or assist with preconstruction services such as project development, permitting, utility coordination, design, schedule and cost estimating. Phase I culminates in the development of one, or multiple, guaranteed maximum price (GMP) packages. Upon owner GMP approval, the CMGC or PDB will proceed with Phase II construction scope. INDOT plans to retain an independent cost estimator (ICE) to provide scope, schedule and cost verification services during Phase I. The main difference between CMGC and PDB is that the owner contracts with the designer of record under the CMGC method while a designer contracts directly with a contractor under the PDB method.

A key purported benefit of the progressive project delivery methods is early collaboration during Phase I or development that includes comprehensive risk identification, analysis of time and costs associated with each risk and assignment of responsibility to mitigate risks if they are realized during the construction phase. The contractual tool used to record and track risks is called a risk register. The risk register becomes part of the contract documents agreed upon prior to moving to Phase II.

INDOT must receive at least two proposals prior to entering into a CMGC or PDB contract under Indiana law. INDOT Major Projects Division staff and their consultants have worked to get industry feedback over the past year through online solicitation, public meetings and meetings with ICI member companies. Indiana law limits INDOT to enter into two progressive contracts per year until 2028.

Contact INDOT Major Projects Delivery Director Jeff Clanton with questions.

INDOT Publishes Intelligent Work Zone Toolkit

Posted on by Dan Osborn

INDOT’s Traffic Administration Office Manager Dave Boruff delivered an early Christmas present on Dec. 11 – notice that the long-anticipated Intelligent Work Zone Design and Implementation Toolkit is available on the Traffic Administration webpage.

“We started developing the Toolkit in 2020. In doing so, we reached out to manufacturers and contractors to get their input on content, the devices, and measures that should be included and how they should be described,” explained Boruff. “The idea behind the Toolkit is to help those involved with planning and implementing work zones become more familiar with treatments that may not currently be standardized but can help improve safety and mobility,” he added.

traffic queue truck

The Toolkit provides readers with equipment (tool) information, strategies and step-by-step guides to address work zone risks such as speed, detour alerts and lane shifts. One such tool is the queue truck warning system as shown in the image above.

ICI would like to thank INDOT for the collaborative execution of this toolkit as Boruff and other INDOT staff invited ICI and ACEC representatives to work on this initiative together.

 

Annual FHWA 1391 Report

Posted on by Dan Osborn

Source: Katie Daniels, INDOT Lead Workforce & Education Specialist

Annual FHWA 1391 Report

This applies to all Prime contractors, subcontractors, and haulers (NOT including material suppliers) working on a federal-aid highway construction contract in excess of $10,000.00.
The FHWA 1391 Report continues to be an ITAP application and all reporting must be done via that application. Paper forms or excel spreadsheets will not be accepted and will be returned. To create an ITAP account go to: https://itap.indot.in.gov/login.aspx and the application needed is called FHWA 1391 Report.

This year’s reporting period will be for the week of July 23-July 29, 2023. Detailed instructions can be found within the FHWA 1391 Report application itself by clicking on the “HELP” icon. The application will open on July 23, 2023 and close on August 31, 2023. Once it closes you will not be able to submit your workforce and you will be in non-compliance with the FHWA requirements.

Workforce reporting is simplified, it is no longer necessary to report your workforce by each individual contract. Instead, each contractor or hauler will be required to submit one FHWA 1391 Report for their entire workforce on ALL federal-aid contracts. If your company does not have workforce on any federal-aid contracts during the reporting period there is a box to click indicating “No Activity” and then submit the report.

Please feel free to contact kdaniels2@indot.in.gov with any questions.

IRI Training Opportunity

Posted on by Dan Osborn
Source: Indiana Department of Transportation Construction Management

INDOT has fully implemented IRI for measuring highway smoothness on all QC/QA HMA & PCCP contracts. The 2023 construction season will be our first with full implementation of IRI utilizing high speed inertial profilers. The following RSP’s are now included in contracts when smoothness measurement is required: RSP 401-R-577 for HMA and RSP 501-R-752 for PCCP.

Recognizing that this is an emerging technology, INDOT will be offering an “Advanced IRI Pavement Smoothness for Construction” training course for contractors. This advanced training will be delivered by Brian Schleppi and Steve Karamihas. Schleppi is retired from the Ohio Department of Transportation and has decades of technical and field-based experience working with both DOT and contractor personnel on IRI equipment and software. Karamihas is a research area specialist at the University of Michigan Transportation Institute and has been involved in the research and development of IRI technology for decades and brings a wealth of knowledge and experience from his work in multiple states.

This “Advanced IRI Pavement Smoothness for Construction” course will cover the effective use of ProVAL by reviewing the following concepts: overall smoothness and payment utilizing the Ride Quality Module, areas of localized roughness utilizing the SAM Module, verifying equipment utilizing the Certification Module, verifying corrective work ahead of time utilizing the Grinding Simulation Module, and much much more.

This training course will be a single day event offered on two separate dates: May 24 and May 25 at INDOT’s Traffic Management Center (TMC) on the east side of Indianapolis. Training will be from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on both days. Cost for the training will be $180 per attendee. To register and make payment for this Advanced IRI training event, please contact our training vendor: Brian Schleppi at (614) 270-7001 or indottraining@vihsc.com.

INDOT and the training vendor require registration and payment be completed by May 11th. This Advanced IRI training requires each operator attending the course to bring a laptop computer and have the latest version of the ProVal software downloaded and installed.

This training is not mandatory and is not required as part of the requirements found in ITM 917 Section 7.1 in order to attend INDOT’s Annual IRI Certification day. All contractor personnel planning to attend this Advanced IRI training event should have already attended one of the mandatory training methods listed in ITM 917 Section 7.1 in order to have a baseline working knowledge of IRI concepts and IRI software use. However, for contractor operators that are re-certifying, this training course will count towards the ITM 917 Section 7.1 Triennial operator training requirement.

INDOT/DOR Working to Improve OSW Permitting

Posted on by Dan Osborn

Several ICI members recently communicated concerns to me about oversize/overweight (OSW) load permitting. Members stated that, as the newly instituted OSW permitting system works well for the majority of loads and routes, concerns remain including difficulty delivering equipment to project sites and unusual long and broken up routing. While members have worked diligently to communicate issues directly to the Indiana Department of Revenue (DOR) and INDOT, ICI’s Director of Government Affairs Dan Osborn followed up with agency contacts to emphasize industry concerns and determine what industry, the DOR and INDOT could do to avoid the issues.

INDOT Multimodal Director Kristen Brier responded to ICI. She explained that the new permitting system includes a more comprehensive evaluation process including “vehicle configuration, origin, and destination to automatically generate a safe route safe route, taking into account road restrictions and closures, vertical clearances for bridges, and bridge load rating.”

“We are working with our vendor to make the location of the failed bridges visible externally, to help applicants determine if a different origin or destination on the state system will avoid those bridges. Information about the road restrictions and closures can be displayed within the permitting system, and it remains available on the Indiana Truckers’ Info page. Bridge vertical clearance information remains available as well, through the online Bridge Clearance Map,” stated Brier.

Brier offered several agency contacts to assist permittees. Contact INDOT Freight Manager Leslie Morgan to disclose unsafe routes or difficulty with a permit involving accessing a project site.

If you need help using the new permitting system, contact DOR Motor Carrier Services Division OSW Supervisor James Vest or Morgan.

Contact Dan Osborn if you have feedback or recommendations about any aspect of OSW permitting.

INDOT EOD Contract Compliance Updates

Posted on by Dan Osborn
SOURCE: Kent Borggren, INDOT Economic Opportunity Division Contract Compliance Manager kborggren@indot.in.gov

Prior to the COVID 19 pandemic, the Contract Compliance section already had plans to update some of our processes.  Here are some of the things that we have been working on, and our future plans:

  • FHWA 1391 – This year the FHWA 1391 will be an ITAP application and must be submitted using that portal. We will not accept paper reports or excel reports. The report will also be ONE per company, not one per contract. This year’s reporting period to gather data on employees working on federally funded construction contracts is July 19 thru July 25, 2020. The ITAP application will be available beginning on July 18 and close on August 31, 2020. All prime contractors, subcontractors, and haulers working on Federally funded contracts with a value over $10,000.00 must report their workforce. If your company does not have workers present during that time period there is a “No Activity” box to check and then you submit your report. 
  • Subcontractor Payment Tracking System (SPT) –  A new version of the SPT system will be available very soon. It will resemble all of the other ITAP applications and will have a few added functions such as editing records, and PDF reports for your convenience. One of the biggest changes to the SPT system is the Subcontractor Verification. All contracts let as part of the July 2020 regular letting and beyond, will include Special Provision 108-C-264 SUBCONTRACTOR PAYMENT VERIFICATION. All subcontractors, and DBE, MBE, WBE, and IVOSB firms (haulers and suppliers) will be required to verify their payments received from the Prime Contractor no later than 20 days after the end of month in which payment was received. The Prime Contractor is responsible for timely reporting of all payments into the SPT system. 
  • DBE-3 –  We continue to meet our statewide DBE goal of 10.1%, this past report covering the period of October 1, 2019 thru March 31, 2020 we achieved 12.95% thanks to the Race Neutral participation of our prime contractors. Standard Specification 103.01(g) requires a DBE-3 form be submitted for all DBE subcontractor/lessor/supplier(s) utilized on any federal aid contract, whether or not they were listed on the Affirmative Action Certification. All completed forms should be submitted to: DBE3@indot.IN.gov. Our long range plan is for the DBE closeout process to be mostly automated.
  • MBE/WBE/IVOSB-3 – Beginning on July 1st our department will begin closing out the MBE/WBE/IVOSB-3 process much like we have been doing for the DBE program. We will be sending out the notification on contract close-out when the IC-642 has been sent to the prime contractor by the district final records section. We ask that beginning July 1 all of the completed MBE/WBE/IVOSB-3 forms be sent to MBE_WBE3@indot.IN.gov. Please be aware of the “_” between MBE and WBE in the email address. 
  • OJT Program – In the next few weeks, our department will begin working on turning our On the Job Training (OJT) Program into an ITAP application. We contemplate that this will greatly simplify email requirements and will store information so that it can be queried throughout the year. If you have any ideas on functionality as this application is developed, please let us know as we begin this development process by emailing Katie Daniels kdaniels2@indot.in.gov and/or Kent Borggren kborggren@indot.in.gov.
  • Affirmative Action Certification (AAC) –  Thank you to all of the prime contractors who have submitted their DBE quotes to us within the 24 hour required time period after contract letting. It has allowed our department to audit all of the quotes and compare them to the AACs and resolve many of our past questions in a very timely fashion. As a reminder, if the quote does not match what you entered onto the AAC please provide written documentation on the quote as to what was revised. Handwriting out an explanation is just fine – so long as it is legible and understandable. Also, even if you meet the DBE goal on the contract and you are committed to using additional DBE firms, please include those on the AAC. In the event there is an error on the AAC and you have listed additional DBE participation, we all might avoid a “Good Faith Efforts” hearing on the contract prior to award due to the extra DBE participation.
  • Change in DBE Utilization – Remember to timely submit your Change in DBE Utilizations as soon as you realize there is an issue with what you have committed to on the AACs. Without an approved Change in DBE Utilization, any work that was performed by someone other than the listed DBE firm will not be paid for by INDOT.  Completed Change in DBE Utilizations should be submitted both to DBEChange@indot.IN.gov and the local EEO Officer for tracking purposes.
  • Prompt Payment –  Just as a reminder all contractors are to pay their subcontractors within 10 business days after being paid by INDOT. If a Subcontractor/hauler/supplier feels that they are not being paid timely by the prime contractor, please submit your concerns to Promptpayment@indot.IN.gov. We will investigate any and all of your concerns. 
  • SMGR Reports (in ITAP) – Within ITAP you can look at one of the applications SMGR Reports which gives you several good pieces of information from our SiteManager program. Once you have access to the SMGR Report application you simply enter in your INDOT contract number and you  have access to several reports. In the top section, the IC642CLN report will give you information on the whole contract. In the lower section, the Progressive Record Activity will give you information on a specific line item and what has been recorded on a daily basis. This is an easy and quick way to see what work has been recorded for payment by the INDOT or Consultant field staff on a particular contract.

If you have any questions or concerns please let me know at: KBorggren@indot.IN.gov.