FAIRHOPE – After the only bid came in too high for federal funding officials to accept, Fairhope will try again to find a way to build the new downtown transit hub.
The Fairhope City Council voted Monday, July 26, to reject the bid for the Downtown Arts Alley Transit Hub to be constructed near the public parking lot north of Fairhope Avenue and east of Church Street. The one bid of almost $1.44 million exceeded engineering estimates by at least $150,000, according to city reports.
Richard Johnson, public works director, said that even with construction costs going up in recent months, the bid was more than expected.
“This probably has been the greatest reviewed bid in the history of the city of Fairhope,” Johnson said. “We ended up with eight potential bidders that attended the pre-bid, the mandatory pre-bidding. We only received one bid. There were some cost anomalies in there, some certain items and the bidder admitted that his subs didn’t get numbers back to him, so they just threw a number that they knew would cover it.”
He said the Federal Transit Administration, which is providing funding for the project, asked that the bid be reviewed before work could move forward.
“They asked us to attempt to contact the other potential bidders and find out why they failed to bid,” Johnson said. “The majority that did respond said they just had too much work and that they just were in for it.”
The transit hub is part of a city plan to create an “Art Alley,” downtown in the block between Fairhope Avenue, Church Street and Section Street. planned as downtown’s latest enhancement. Project supporters said in earlier meetings that the alley could serve as a major walking and gathering place for people during events such as the Fairhope Arts and Crafts Festival or strollers walking through downtown.
The site is a five-minute walk to the edge of downtown and 10 minutes from Mobile Bay.
Among the plans for the site would be to build a transit hub for Baldwin Rural Area Transit System shuttles and location for pedestrians to gather in the center of town. The county transit system now has a hub east of downtown on Fairhope Avenue near the Satellite Courthouse.
