Soaring price makes Georgetown change course on pedestrian bridge design

Approved designs for the Austin Avenue pedestrian bridges — which were okayed by Georgetown City Council in the spring of 2024 — will be changed, as the costs for the previously planned truss-inspired bridges have significantly increased due to an underestimation in steel quantities required. 

The proposed new pedestrian bridges over the two forks of the San Gabriel River will replace the sidewalks that had been located on the Austin Avenue vehicular bridges, which are in the process of being rehabilitated and having their lanes widened.

Construction for the truss-inspired design was initially estimated and approved at $14.6 million, but the construction estimate ballooned to $23.4 million during what the city said was the 90 percent design check in with engineering firm Freese and Nichols. 

“We had spent a lot of time with [city council] getting the money that was needed for this project, so we wanted to make sure as the design moved along that we were still going to have the funding needed,” Assistant City Manager Nick Woolery, in describing design check-ins at the 30 percent, 60 percent and 90 percent design stages. 

Mr. Woolery added after checking with several different contractors and engineers, the $23.4 million cost might be a low estimate. 

“We couldn’t get hard bids, but we had another contractor who has done bridge work throughout the region and they, really at their own expense, spent some time just looking through the plans, looking through prices that are currently out there and also talking to engineers who have done similar work and [said it could be a low estimate],” Mr. Woolery said. 

Mr. Woolery said Freese and Nichols have taken full responsibility for the mistake in steel quantities and have already “made changes to their internal project team” and are offering a “significant” refund of their design fees back to the city. 

“We’re human and we make mistakes,” Freese and Nichols CEO Brian Coltharp told city council Tuesday, December 9. “We firmly believe that when we make mistakes, what differentiates us is how we handle that. That’s why we’re here today. We apologize for the mistake, we own it, and we want to do everything we can to make it right with the city.” 

Three options were presented to city council on Tuesday on how to move forward with the project: 

• Redesign the pedestrian bridges in a way that prioritizes functional needs, with bridge options ranging in cost from $14.3 million to $20.2 million.
• Extend the “Austin Avenue road diet” — which would take Austin Avenue down to one lane in each direction with a center turn lane through downtown Georgetown — across the vehicular bridges to incorporate wider lanes and pedestrian sidewalks to the rehabilitated vehicular bridge, with an estimated cost of $2.5 million
• Maintain existing 10- foot lane widths across the Austin Avenue vehicular bridges to accommodate a sidewalk alongside vehicular traffic lanes. 

“What we wanted to initially look at was, is there a way to just trim some costs,” Mr. Woolery said. “When you’ve got a bridge that — for lack of a better word — is as elegant as the bridge option was, there’s not a lot of trimming back costs. Once you’ve done that, you’ve taken away really the look of the bridge. So that wasn’t really an option.” 

After looking at options, the general consensus from council was to continue pursuing separate pedestrian bridges, but to have a design that would include pre-stressed concrete girders underneath to support the bridge. The new design would cost about $14.7 million, with $2.8 million included in a contingency budget. 

“From a bridge redesign standpoint, this really put focus back on the functional needs, not that they aren’t attractive options, but it really focused on the functional needs because we do need to get pedestrians and potentially bikes across those two bridges,” Mr. Woolery said. 

Council Member Amanda Parr said the option that has the concrete supporting the simpler bridge design follows most of the original project goals and feedback from residents. 

“I think we need to move forward with a pedestrian bridge, I still think that that is what our original intention was and something that the public seems to be excited about,” she said. 

Council Member Ben Butler echoed similar statements saying the sidewalk on the current bridge isn’t wide enough even if it’s expanded to six feet. He said he doesn’t want to put pedestrians and vehicles on the same bridge and advocated for the concrete girder design. 

“[This design] financially and aesthetically I think is the best,” he said. 

With the current pedestrian bridge over the rivers being fixed because of summer flood damage, City Manager David Morgan said some temporary solutions will be implemented while the new pedestrian bridges will be built so people can still cross over the river. 

Project background 

In November 2023, city council was presented with three design options for the pedestrian bridges. Price estimates included $14 million, $17.7 million and $18.5 million options. 

Although city council had previously expressed interest in a the simplistic design that was less expensive, in March 2024, the council formally selected the middle option, which included the truss-inspired design. The construction estimate at the time was $14.6 million, with about $17.7 million for the entire project. 

In a follow-up action, city council on April 9, 2024, approved a design contract with Freese and Nichols in the amount of $2.8 million. 

The total project budget approved by city council, according to the powerpoint shown to council this week, is $21,160,440. About $17,778,617 of that budget remains. 

“The city has applied for three grants to cover roughly $11 million of the project. All three of those grants were not awarded,” Mr. Woolery said. “Two of those were through TxDOT directly, which we had some hope we would receive. They’ve awarded similar grants to other cities, but unfortunately, we were not selected for any of those grants.”