Promontory Point is that desolate place in the middle of northern Utah, where in 1869 two train track laying crews met to connect the nation's first transcontinental railroad.
Everyone's seen that famous picture where the crews are standing on the two locomotives having a toast as the golden spike was driven into the last section of rail.
Why not apply the same principle to the widening of Highway 40 through St. Louis?
Hire two companies, start one on the east end of the expansion, the other on the west end. Build in bench mark and completion date incentives to the construction contracts, and make it a competition between the two companies. The company exceeding the most benchmark goals and the final completion goal date by the greatest number of days gets a BIG final incentive payment. Just think of the gaming possibilities!
Track the competition in St. Louis media. Then sometime during 2008 or 2009 (hopefully), when the job is finished somewhere around Highway 40 and McKnight, recreate the Promontory Point photograph, with the crews of roadbuilders sitting atop massive tractors, along with the County Executive and the Mayor of St. Louis, all raising commemorative mugs of famous St. Louis beverages in a toast to the successful completion of this massive civic endeavor.
Have fun with it!
Oh, and build it so that at least one lane remains open in both directions during construction.
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3 comments:
There is so much misleading information about this project it is difficult to find a place to start.
The highway divides a community/neighborhoods and I have yet to read any commentary about what this means to property owners along this route.
One group that should be consulted are the residents along the route who will be most inconvenienced by the project. However, MoDOT and local officials continue to avoid these residents.
Yes the project would hopefully be completed at the lowest level of pain... especially for those most impacted.
That makes about as much sense (or lack thereof) as having two teams of builders start on either end of a house. You wouldn't have specialized workers or sub-contractors working the entire duration of home construction, going from room to room.
If they used two teams to build a transcontinental railroad, working toward the middle, why wouldn't the same concept work for building a highway?
Create competition between the two teams, and possibly move up the completion date.
Hardly analgous to building a new house.
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