The Regional Transportation District broke ground in August on the $1-billion East Corridor commuter rail line, the largest single-rail project in the voter-approved FasTracks program.

The Colorado Office of the State Architect awarded a design services contract for the $11.6-million Colorado State Capitol Dome Exterior Restoration Project to Lakewood�s Martin/Martin Inc.

The East Corridor is part of the FasTracks Eagle P3 project, a public-private partnership that also includes the Gold Line to Arvada and Wheat Ridge and a segment of the Northwest Rail Corridor to south Westminster. Phase 1 of the Eagle P3 project includes the East Corridor, a new commuter rail maintenance facility and design for the Gold Line and a short segment of Northwest Rail, the purchase of Electric Multiple Unit rail vehicles and new electrical systems at Denver Union Station.

Phase 2, which will build out the Gold Line and a short segment of the Northwest Rail Line, is scheduled to begin following the award of a Full Funding Grant Agreement by the Federal Transit Administration, anticipated in 2011.

Once the whole Eagle P3 project is under construction, it is expected to create up to 5,000 jobs per year in 2012-13, including direct, indirect and induced jobs that branch out to the larger economy.

The Colorado Office of the State Architect, Dept. of Personnel & Administration, has awarded the design services contract for the Colorado State Capitol Dome Exterior Restoration Project to the team of Martin/Martin Inc. Consulting Engineers, Lakewood; and Quinn Evans Architects, Ann Arbor, Mich.

This high-profile project, estimated at $11.6 million, will begin once a construction manager/general contractor is chosen by the OSA.

Denver’s Humphries Poli Architects has a regionally recognized preservation practice and will be the local associate architect for the project. Other key design team members include Cobra Consulting, Denver—whose president has six years of previous work experience with the Colorado State Capitol Life Safety Project—and Historical Arts and Casting, Salt Lake City, one of the premier metalwork renovation and manufacturing specialists in the United States.

Specialized consultants who round out the team are: Rider Levett Bucknall, cost consultant; BCER Engineering Inc., mechanical and electrical engineering; A.G. Wassenaar, environmental engineering; and Gary Steffy Lighting Design Inc.