The Standard & Poor’s and Fitch bond rating services have assigned a ‘BBB’ rating with a ‘stable’ outlook to the US$677m (£444m) in private activity bonds that will finance the project. In its report, Standard & Poor’s notes that this is the first time it has issued a rating for a public-private partnership of this type in the United States.
East End Crossing is a public-private agreement between WVB East End Partners and the Indiana Finance Authority. It involves a 762m-long cable-stayed main bridge across the Ohio River to link Louisville, Kentucky, to Southern Indiana as well as a 512m-long twin-bore tunnel on the Kentucky approach, 19 additional smaller bridges and associated work. The scheme is part of the larger Ohio River Bridges Project.
The consortium, led by Vinci Concessions, also will be responsible for the operation, routine maintenance and rehabilitation of a substantial portion of the East End Crossing for a period of 35 years.
The works, scheduled to take 3.5 years, will be executed by a design-build joint venture including Walsh Construction (60%), Vinci Construction Grands Projets (40%) and Jacobs Engineering for the engineering works. Construction is set to start in May and completion is expected by autumn 2016. The total value of the contract is approximately US$1bn.
Got a story? Email news@theconstructionindex.co.uk
