A local contractor has incurred penalties after resurfacing of Highway 61 scheduled to have been finished in mid-October won’t be completed until next spring.
“At the present time, Taranis (Contracting Group) has exceeded their completion date so penalties are being imposed on them,” said Wayne Prystanski, regional contracts engineer for the Ministry of Transportation.
The MTO is working with the company to get as much work as possible done on their contract this year, but there are some areas of the highway that haven’t been touched yet.
“They have been advised by the ministry that any work they have opened up to date, which involves a lot of the milling that the public will see towards the southerly end of the contract,” Prystanski said.
“Taranis will be paving that and then they will be getting the highway ready for winter shutdown.”
They will return in the spring to complete the work.
Taranis is involved in three ministry contracts in addition to the work they’re doing for the City of Thunder Bay.
Prystanski said all of the ministry’s contracts have designated completion dates or are assigned a specific number of working days; if the contractor doesn’t complete the project on time they are charged liquidated damages.
In a statement issued to the media, Taranis’ general manager Ryan Jones said it’s regrettable the project must be delayed despite the best efforts of a highly experienced project team.
“It is agreed by all parties that postponement is the most appropriate course of action to ensure that the quality of the highway paving project is not compromised,” the statement reads.
