Daily Sitka Sentinel

ANB Harbor Project Lands Region Award

By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
    The ANB Harbor replacement project has received recognition from a regional trade publication as a “top project under $10 million” for 2014.
    Public Works Director Michael Harmon received the news last week from the city’s consultant Moffatt & Nichol, which submitted the entry to the Engineering News-Record for the Best Projects prize in Alaska, Washington and Oregon.

ANB Harbor. (Sentinel Photo)

    The project will be honored at an event Dec. 5 in Seattle, and be featured alongside the other winners in the first issue of ENR Northwest magazine in 2015.
    Harmon used the occasion of the award to give credit to the engineering team, in particular Sitka Senior Engineer Dan Tadic, who “showed exemplary leadership in his management of the award-winning ANB Harbor Project.”
    Harmon said today that Tadic not only acted as project manager but also as general contractor since he had to coordinate the two major contractors hired for the installation and float construction.
    “It was really dicey,” Harmon said. “It was juggling a lot of work, and putting in a lot of hours. It was a lot more labor-intensive than a normal project. It did yield in getting the project done fast, and at a lower cost, at the end of the day.”
    Harmon shared the news with city leadership and others who worked on the project in an email, which was passed on to Assembly members.
    “One could say that Dan was simply doing his job,” Harmon wrote. “However, anyone who is familiar with the management of capital projects knows that you do not receive these types of awards by simply doing your job. These awards come by way of extra dedication, hard work, ingenuity and most importantly the courage to lead a project in a unique way that yielded special results.”
    City Administrator Mark Gorman acknowledged the work also of the electric, harbor and finance departments.
    ANB Harbor replacement was among 22 entries in 14 categories for the award, and selected by four industry professionals, ENR Northwest said in its announcement.
    Harmon noted that the project was completed “under a timeline that many consultants said was impossible,” and the harbor was finished under budget.
    “This was accomplished by way of a unique contracting methodology of separating the float construction from the installation contract,” Harmon said. “This method of contracting comes with potential risks that are significant if not managed aggressively.  For this reason Dan had to step up and essentially act as the general contractor and project manager. If it wasn’t for Dan’s extraordinary level of teamwork, professionalism and leadership this project had a number of circumstances that could have turned bad quickly, costing the CBS significant time and money.”
    Harmon said the floats were delivered late, which could have caused delays. Tadic responded by motivating the supplier to deliver the floats to Sitka instead of Seattle.
    “This was done while ensur(ing) a legal agreement was in place to protect the CBS from delay cost,” Harmon said. “There were a number of examples of design errors and problems that Dan worked tirelessly to resolve before they became a delay claim, including tracking down leftover piling from another community in Southeast.”
    The replacement of the nearly 60-year-old city-owned facility was completed in 14 months, coming in $1.2 million under the $8.5 million budget, said engineers from Moffatt & Nichol, who worked with the city. The budget covered taking on “challenging and variable geotechnical conditions and often inclement weather,” and expanding the project to add more upland improvements, said Shaun G. McFarlane, from Moffatt & Nichol of Anchorage.
    The city expects to cover the $7.8 million final cost of the harbor with a $4.25 million revenue bond and a $4.25 million matching grant from the state, Tadic said. The harbor has a few vacancies, but harbor staff said those slips are currently being assigned from the waiting list.
    Tadic said today he has heard no complaints recently about the harbor, following some initial concerns from a few harbor users when it opened. But he noted that the electric contractors have had to make some changes to the electrical system to comply with the new national electrical code for marinas. The changes, costing about $25,000, were paid for by the consultants and the state grant.
    Still left to be done is paving of a 150-foot strip near the upland entrance to the harbor, Tadic said.