DALLAS – After receiving only one proposal for a $1 billion managed toll lanes development on the Airport Freeway in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, the Texas Department of Transportation is enlarging the project and seeking more bidders.
In December, Spanish developer Cintra was the only company to respond to a request for qualifications for 2-3 miles of toll lanes between Dallas and Fort Worth.
Cintra was one of 12 construction and engineering firms that responded to an earlier request for information.
The RFQ process is managed by the SB 1420 Committee, named for the 2011 Senate bill that allowed TxDOT to toll SH 183. Earlier this month, the committee reconvened and decided to cancel the previous RFQ, said TxDOT spokesman Mark Cross.
The Texas Transportation Commission will meet next week and consider enlarging the project in hopes of gaining more interest, Cross said.
“We certainly at this point had hoped that we would be pretty close to selecting a proposer,” Cross said. “It has delayed the project.”
Cintra, which operates in Texas with partners such as Zachry Construction in San Antonio, is building six major highways, including two interstates, worth more than $5 billion. Cintra Zachry is building what was once known as the Trans-Texas Corridor, a high-speed tollway paralleling Interstate 35 and designed for truck traffic to and from Mexico, Canada and other parts of the United States under the North American Free Trade Agreement.
In the Dallas-Fort Worth area, Cintra is partnering with other firms on the $2.1 billion North Tarrant Express in Tarrant County. Cintra is also the lead partner in the LBJ Express, which includes the expansion of Interstate 635/LBJ Freeway in Dallas.
Senate Bill 1420 applies to TxDOT toll projects in which a private entity has a financial interest in the project's performance.
SB 1420 added language requiring that the distribution of the project's financial risk, the method of financing for the project, and the tolling structure and methodology must be determined by a SB 1420 Committee.
