Contractor Sues HART Over Construction Delays

HONOLULU, Hawaii – HART’s hired contractor, Shimmick/Traylor/Granite Joint Venture has sued HART for over $99 million.

Honolulu Civil Beat reported a lawsuit filed by STG against Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation (HART). Citing “HART’s failure to address problems with the relocation of utilities” as the chief reason for delayed construction, STG filed a lawsuit and stated that “HART was warned well in advance about issues related to utilities in the path of the project, and HART told bidders it was aware of the danger and was coping with the problem.” Back in 2016, STG was awarded a contract for $875 million “to build four stations and about 5 miles of elevated track from Aloha Stadium to Middle Street.” 

According to Honolulu Civil Beat, the suit “alleges that the rail authority ‘had taken effective steps to ensure the utility line relocation work would not hinder or delay STG’s ability to timely construct the AGS guideway” and that the relocation designs for utilities were “90% complete”, and STG states that those designs were not nearly as complete as HART said.

HART responded to the lawsuit in a written statement, commenting that “HART respects STG and the work the joint venture has performed on the Airport segment of the Honolulu rail project, but disagrees with the characterization in STG’s lawsuit of the nature of the claims and the alleged damages suffered. . . While the issues described by STG arose prior to Kahikina’s administration, HART has been in active negotiations with STG about these claims for over two years in an effort to reach a fair settlement. HART continues to work with STG daily to complete the next segment of the project.”

STG asserts the delays were significant and presented these problems to HART “along with the impact they had on the rail construction schedule[.] The rail authority took three years to negotiate and execute change orders to address the delays.”

Additionally, STG states that it had to “absorb the cost of those delays”, and moreover, it was not “equitably compensated for the delays caused by untimely reviews, revisions, and approvals of STG’s utility infrastructure designs.”

Though proud of its work on the Honolulu Rail Transit Project, STG is “disappointed that HART continues to neglect its obligations and to avoid taking responsibility for delays outside our control.”