In June the Regional Transportation District�s Board of Directors voted unanimously to award its single-largest FasTracks contract, a public-private partnership known as Eagle P3, to the Denver Transit Partners consortium. The group will design, build, operate and maintain the commuter rail lines to Denver International Airport, Arvada-Wheat Ridge and south Westminster for the next 40 years.

Denver Transit Partners� proposal came in at $2.085 billion�$300 million lower than RTD�s estimate of $2.385 billion. The proposal also included opening the central line between Denver and DIA by January 2016, 11 months ahead of RTD�s deadline. RTD staff rated Denver Transit Partners� proposal higher on technical grounds than that of its sole competing bidder.

Denver Transit Partners consists of Fluor Enterprises Inc. and Australia�s Macquarie Capital Group Ltd., as sponsoring members. They are joined by major partners Ames Construction, Balfour Beatty Rail Inc., Alternate Concepts Inc. and HDR.

Relocation of utilities and freight tracks along the DIA route are slated to begin this summer.