Atkins, a member of the SNC-Lavalin Group, has been awarded a six-year, $31m contract to provide design engineering services for the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) along the Floyd Hill section of the I-70 Mountain Corridor, the main route from Denver to mountain resort areas.
The aim is to relieve the notoriously congested highway section that leads to some of Colorado’s most popular skiing destinations.
“The Floyd Hill area is a bottleneck that travelers tend to avoid,” said Brad Dennard, Atkins Department of Transportation Business Unit Director. “Once this project is complete, it will alleviate 10 miles of congestion and an hour of travel time, making it a more enjoyable journey to some of the best places in Colorado.”
“The I-70 Mountain Corridor is vital to commuters who live and work in the mountain communities and essential for freight and transit in western destinations,” said George Nash, CEO of Atkins North America.
“Leveraging our past experience on the recently completed Veterans Memorial Tunnels and Mountain Express Lanes projects, our team is well positioned to help CDOT create safer, more enjoyable travel with the successful completion of this project."
High-traffic volume on I-70 west of Denver has led to ever-increasing periods of slow traffic or gridlock. The section can also be affected by adverse weather.
Major elements of the project include replacing deficient infrastructure, adding a third westbound lane to increase highway capacity and implementing curve safety modifications to improve travel speeds and sight distance.
