Amid intense media attention, a design-build team on July 16 closed one of the most congested highway stretches in the country, demolished half an iconic bridge and reopened the 10-mile stretch to traffic 17 hours ahead of schedule—and earned a $300,000 bonus.
The $1-billion Sepulveda Pass widening will add high-occupancy vehicle lanes to a stretch of Interstate 405 in Los Angeles. The last of three bridges to be demolished and rebuilt, the Mulholland Bridge is the most significant. “We built it in 1959,” says Dan Kulka, spokesman for Kiewit Infrastructure West, the design-build team's lead contractor. “And now we will rebuild it.”