Geology ranged from hard lime rock on the west end of the project corridor to sandier soils toward the east, and there were some areas of highly contaminated soils. Adds Case, "We've had issues where, in certain areas, the project was built on top of a landfill. We drove through one area and pulled up a Corvette."

O'Reilly says the team has exceeded the state's voluntary goal of 8.1% for disadvantaged business enterprises as well as the federally required 118 construction trainees. The concessionaire also operates an around-the-clock "road ranger" service that responds to incidents running the gamut from debris removal to stranded motorists.

Most civil construction is complete. Major activities now include paving and installation of variable message signs, cameras, access gates, fiber optics and landscaping, including 9,500 new trees and 160,000 shrubs and grasses, adds Molina.

A single-gantry structure will service the three express lanes, which will run eastbound in the mornings, receiving traffic from ramps that connect to I-75, the Sawgrass Expressway and eastbound Route 84. Once in the lanes, motorists can directly access the Florida Turnpike, says David Sweeney, senior vice president of transportation with Reynolds, Smith & Hills (RS&H), FDOT's design manager; FDOT's I-595 construction manager is the Corradino Group. The express lanes rejoin the general-purpose lanes east of Route 7, linking to I-95, U.S. 1, Port Everglades and Fort Lauderdale International Airport. In the evenings, the express lanes will run westbound.

The express lanes also will have a fire-suppression system that features a dry-pipe system that is serviced by fire hydrants along eastbound Route 84. The system includes hose connections at intervals within the barrier walls. The hose connections will be mobile enough to serve most of the general-purpose lanes.

Because there is limited access to the new express lanes, FDOT worked closely with emergency-responder agencies to identify the most practical locations for emergency access gates, adds Sweeney. The five remote-controlled openings located in the barrier walls will allow emergency vehicles to reach the express lanes.

Partnering Practice

FDOT began seriously considering a public-private partnership for the project in 2006, says Phil Schwab, RS&H P3 market leader. "Over the course of the next 18 months, we held meetings, industry forums and one-on-one talks. We didn't release the final request for proposals until 2008. That's a good year of dedicated planning to make sure P3 was appropriate for this project." Even with advance preparation, the process entailed growing pains, says O'Reilly. "We didn't start with a good review system. That led to friction. Within two months of starting construction, we quickly realized we needed to modify the process." RS&H assembled a team of reviewers to develop a manual and clearly defined goals, objectives, roles and responsibilities within the organizational structure, says Sweeney. "The reviews were then consolidated by a lead engineer, who looked for conflicting comments between disciplines as well as [superfluous] comments," he says. "The reviewers and the lead also identified comments that fell under contractual requirements as well as more 'for your information.' "

As the project progressed, FDOT and RS&H shifted their role to more of a quality-assurance auditor, meticulously organizing the process so that it was streamlined to 21 days from 28, Sweeney adds. One lesson learned was "to resist the urge to add scope," says Schwab. "When people see the improvements, it's tempting to add on a little here or there to make it even better. You have to guard against it. If you add scope, you add schedule, and then you're really affecting how each contractor did its work and the structure of the availability payments."

Also key to the P3 was allowing the concessionaire to select from a menu of predetermined milestones and place them within certain time periods, adds Sweeney. "When the concessionaire meets the milestone on schedule, it earns the full bonus and will collect it with its first final acceptance payment. If the concessionaire misses the agreed-to date, the bonus money is reduced by 1% for each day they miss up to 100 days," notes Sweeney.

Finalizing the overall plan was difficult, says Marc Hackbarth, senior project manager with AECOM, the design subcontractor for Dragados. In addition to FDOT and the concessionaire, says Hackbarth, "you have a number of municipalities and the turnpike authority, so you have several masters, each with their own ideas. On top of that, it's fairly typical in design-build—and even more so in P3s, with the longer-term maintenance issues—that everyone has their own interests. And they're not always the same."

The devil was in the delivery details. For example, "lengths of ramps, how sharp a turn they make—those type of things can delay development," says Hackbarth. "You have to come to agreement on specific things as opposed to the broad goals that come out with the RFP." Moreover, noting Dragados' Spanish roots, he adds that there are differences in how agencies do things "even within different counties, let alone countries."

Such early hurdles somewhat delayed the start of full-blown construction in mid-2010, Hackbarth notes, but eventually the project team hit its stride. "Everyone learns how to work together. You set up review meetings, and you get more timely in processing them," Hackbarth says. "Once those processes were set up, we were able to recover the time."

This article was updated to 6/20/2013 to correct the spelling of Jerry O'Reilly's name.