B.ig design-build infrastructure projects often turn out to be money-losers for design-build contractors, preventing contractors from covering their overhead, much less earning a profit, according to a new study. Large highway and bridge projects, many involving public-private partnerships, are the least profitable of all infrastructure work.

Carried out by Travelers National Construction Services Surety team, the study looked at 224 highway, bridge, rail, transit and tunnel projects with different project delivery methods from 2004 to 2020. All projects had contract values between $250 million and $4 billion and almost all were projects on which Travelers had been the surety or co-surety.

On more than four out of 10 design-build projects, the study found, the design-build contractor failed to cover its costs. And on mega-projects with a value of $250 million or more, the contractor often fared better when traditional design-bid-build procurement was used, according to the study

“如果承包商有设计责任，总的来说，普通利润率下降了77％，”旅行者担保的首席承保官Stan Halliday说。

Public-private partnerships performed the worst. “My understanding is that owners see design-build in such projects as almost completely a risk-transfer mechanism to the contractor and it hasn’t worked well,” says Halliday.

With Congress now weighing a big infrastructure funding measure, Halliday says that “if P3s are part of it, we have to rethink what we are doing. Contractors are aware of the problems but I’m not sure the owners believe them.”

最近有一个可能的例子，研究摘要中未提及。新利18备用

A Kiewit-led team is in federal court with the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey over disputed costs on the $1.5-billion replacement Goethals Bridge between New Jersey and Staten Island, N.Y. Work was completed in 2018, and Kiewit has made an estimated $100-million claim tied to its costs on that project that the agency refuses to pay.

A full copy of Travelers' research methods for its infrastructure study and results has not yet been made public, but the summary released this month echoes prior studies of design-build. Those studies suggest that design-build, in order to yield good results on big projects, must be carried out in a collaborative spirit, with a shared interpretation of the contract terms and an experienced team leader in charge of work.

Halliday says that in CM/GC arrangements, where the construction manager provides a price guarantee, and progressive design-build procurement models, work better. Those delivery methods usually involve the contractor or design-builder in the earliest phases of design development so that it can set the guaranteed maximum price at 50% to 75% or higher of the design.

“Contractors find they can’t provide price on 30% design,” says Halliday. “It’s just not working. The under-billing results in a lot of claims.”

根据旅行者的学习，CM / GC合同“如果有任何新利18备用未解决的索赔和基础设施工作的账单，则会产生少数人，允许承包商提出预期利润。”

“The jobs get done on time and there aren’t any disputes,” adds Halliday.

Response to Design-Build Problems

There are many reasons that complicated mega-projects go over-budget and exceed schedules, notes Lisa Washington, chief executive of the Design-Build Institute of America. Not all can be traced to design-build.

B.ut the Travelers study is another example that design-build "is not a panacea," says Washington, and must be executed with the proper amount of collaboration and experienced leadership in order to fulfill its promise.

“需要一个思维转移。这是一个心态和合同，”她补充道。

为了解决潜在的陷阱，自2014年以来，DBIA已有“设计 - 建造就完成了正确的”教育倡议，今年将在其设计制造的计划中探索。

Travelers, too, believes some of the poor results are due to on contractors' underestimating the risks on some of these mega-procurements.

但基础设施研究很重要，旅行者在一份声明中发布的新利18备用一份声明，因为工作应以最大限度地减少争端的方式进行，以便及时完成提供更大的确定性，最能保护纳税人美元“，并允许承包商有合理的实现可接受的财务回报的机会。“