Construction manager contract awarded to extend light-rail line from Pomona to Claremont

The last contractor needed for the 2.3-mile extension of the A Line light-rail from Pomona to Claremont - to begin preliminary construction work for the last leg that will bring the line to the eastern edge of Los Angeles County - was awarded a contract on Wednesday, May 27 by the Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension Construction Authority.

A team led by Skanska USA, a firm familiar with building bridges, tunnels, infrastructure and large buildings, was awarded a pre-construction contract for $6.3 million as the construction manager.

The team, a joint group with Skanska USA Civil West California District Inc., Stacy and Witbeck, Inc., and Herzog Contracting Corp., will look over the designs of the project being done by Parsons Transportation Group and come up with a construction plan and schedule from a construction point of view.

More importantly, the Skanska team will negotiate a full-on construction contract and offer a bid to the Construction Authority, expected by the Fall of 2027. If the price is within the Authority's budget for the project, then the Skanska team will build the entire project. If not, the Construction Authority can reject it and find another construction contractor.

"The design team and the construction manager will work together for a year and a half. Then the construction manager will give us a bid. We will give it the thumbs up if we have sufficient funds for that," said Habib Balian, CEO of the Construction Authority in an interview on Thursday, May 28.

"This is it. This could be our last procurement if they come in with a bid we can afford," Balian added.

The Construction Authority was awarded $798 million from LA Metro in October 2024 to extend the A Line (previously known as the Gold Line) less than three miles to Claremont. The money came from state Senate Bill 1 dollars that are funneled from taxes on gasoline, diesel fuel and a fee added to vehicle registrations. About $200 million will be spent on the design, real estate acquisitions, administration, right-of-ways and permits with railroad firms whose tracks must be moved to make way for the light-rail tracks.

This leaves about $600 million for actual construction, said Balian.

At the end of January, when the Construction Authority awarded the design bid to Parsons, Balian said he felt optimistic about getting a final bid that would fit their budget.

Though relatively short, the extension into Claremont is complicated. It will involve building bridges over Garey Avenue, Towne Avenue and Indian Hill Boulevard in Claremont. Also, some of the biggest costs come from relocating about a mile of the Metrolink track and a half-mile of freight track, said Chris Burner, chief project officer.

The station at Claremont will be the second one on the A Line that also has a Metrolink Station, the other is Pomona. This may increase the transfer of Metrolink riders coming from the Inland Empire to the light-rail at these A-Line stations.

The A Line currently is 57.6 miles long with 48 stations, the longest light-rail line in the world, according to LA Metro and the Construction Authority.

It currently runs from Long Beach to Pomona, through downtown Los Angeles, Highland Park and Pasadena, with stations in the foothill cities of the San Gabriel Valley. Adding the next station at Claremont would bring the train line to nearly 60 miles long, with 49 stations. The extension from Glendora to Pomona opened on Sept. 19.

Major construction on the Pomona to Claremont extension is expected to take four years, possibly starting in late 2027 and completing in late 2031, according to the Construction Authority.

Originally, this line was approved to reach into San Bernardino County, with its eastern terminus at the Montclair Transit Center. But in September, the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority's Board of Directors voted 15-11 to defund the agency's portion of the planned extension of the A Line from Pomona to Montclair, citing concerns about increasing costs and limited input into decisions related to the project.

Will it ever go to Montclair?

Since Montclair is in San Bernardino County, the Construction Authority needs permission to build the line to the Montclair Transit Center. And the SBCTA will have to pay some of the cost.

"It is up to them (SBCTA) to determine if they want to implement the project (to Montclair)," Balian said, even though the Authority was given permission to build in San Bernardino County by the state Legislature. "We need their support and their funding. And it doesn't seem to be there now," he added.

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