East Texas Roundup

Slow, Steady Growth Keeps Contractors Busy

By Jennifer Hiller

Steady university enrollment growth, the success of school bond issues and population increases continue to fuel construction throughout East Texas.

East Texas construction has been characterized by slow-but-steady growth that hasn't brought in the highest-dollar projects in the state but has managed to keep contractors busy.

"There are a lot of small $2 million to $3 million projects," said John Steger, East Texas director of QUOIN, the Dallas/Fort Worth chapter of the Association of General Contractors.

QUOIN, which serves a 26-county swath of East Texas, estimates that about $300 million in construction is under way in the region.

K-12 Building a Boon

East Texas school bond elections continue to be successful. Most prominently, a $96 million bond package was approved in December for Tyler ISD that will renovate or build eight elementary schools.

The passage was seen as a huge victory for the district and community boosters, especially after the high-profile failure of its last $297 million bond.

This time, with a new superintendent at the helm and the help of Staubach Co., a Dallas-area consulting firm that was hired as bond manager, the district repackaged the projects and organized an intense campaign that included direct mail and demographic studies. Only the most critical projects were put on this bond program; an additional $300 million in work will be put to voters in phases over the next several years.

Staubauch took a real-estate-management approach and helped convince voters that the district's elementary schools - which average 67 years in age - were in need of repair, Steger said. It also brought in business leaders to help campaign and got the local taxpayers' group to support the measure.

Longview voters in December approved a $45 million bond proposal for Pine Tree ISD. Planned projects include new middle and primary campuses and a ninth-grade addition to Pine Tree High School. The district is also planning floor, HVAC and electrical work at two campuses.

Several East Texas school districts had bond elections planned early this year. If successful, a $38 million bond package at Mabank ISD would add a new high school, convert the old campus into a middle school and renovate the elementary school. Eustace ISD would use $13 million to add classrooms to four campuses, air-condition the primary-school gym and construct a prekindergarten building, $4 million gymnasium and new library and media center.

A $45 million bond project was wrapping up at Mount Pleasant ISD in Titus County, while a $47 million bond program approved in 2001 is scheduled to complete next month at Nacogdoches ISD, where all of the district's schools were renovated and a new ninth-grade center, competition gym, elementary school and middle school were built.

East Texas contractors are keeping an eye on the Texas Legislature's attempts to retool the current school funding system. Known as "Robin Hood," the funding method has been a boon for some of the smaller school districts throughout the region because the state has picked up a large portion of the bill for construction and renovation.

"In the last four or five years, schools have really taken advantage of the funds available," Steger said. "A lot of the districts in the middle of nowhere have really nice facilities."

Smaller districts still tend to favor the traditional sealed-bid contracts, although QUION is hoping to run some workshops on construction delivery systems to help districts better understand their options.

advertisement

Transportation Developments

Regional contractors, civic leaders and lawmakers are watching the development of the Trans-Texas Corridor project, which has the potential to combine rail, freight, highway and utility lines in a massive north-south highway that would parallel Interstate 35.

Whether it would run to the west or east of Dallas hasn't been determined, but the $6.5 billion project would have the potential to be an economic catalyst for the region. In December, TxDOT selected a private consortium led by Spanish toll-road operator Cintra and San Antonio-based Zachry Construction Corp. to develop the first phase of the corridor.

Early projections have shown the route as far east as Wood County, and Steger said he is hoping that the area's wealth of state lawmakers - two senators and 11 representatives - could help bring the route through East Texas. "We have more impact than people realize," he added.

For now, an outer loop for Tyler - once seen as a distant idea - is becoming a reality for the city, with the $22.3 million contract for the first phase of Loop 49 awarded to Young Contractors Inc. of Waco. Work started in August 2003 and is about 50 percent complete, said Steven Hall, Tyler area engineer for TxDOT.

The first phase is a 5-mi. stretch of highway that runs from State Highway 155 south of Tyler to U.S. Highway 69. TxDOT will award the contract for the second phase of the project next month. The approximately $12 million project will include a 2-mi. area from U.S. 69 East to FM 756. Ultimately, Loop 49 will be constructed as a divided four-lane roadway and is being evaluated as a possible toll road, Hall said.

The most talked about road project in Tyler, however, is a $6 million effort to redo pavement and construct medians on Broadway, the city's main thoroughfare. Traffic accidents caused by left-turning cars had become a problem, and traffic had increased to about 41,000 cars a day, Hall said.

Austin-based Austin Bridge & Road has crews working at night to avoid peak hours and complete the work quickly, but the installation of medians on the six-lane road has drawn fire from local residents because it limits where people can make left-hand turns, Hall said.

The city's mall and most of its shopping and restaurants are located along Broadway. Hall said the project should be complete by the beginning of November.

TxDOT has also started work on State Highway 155 in Anderson County and on U.S. Highway 175 north of Athens to create four-lane roads to accommodate the heavy truck traffic that passes through the area.

The eight-county area in the Tyler TxDOT district recently received $116 million of the state's $600 million safety bond money. The money more than doubles the district's average annual spending and will be used to add shoulders and left-hand turn lanes to rural roadways. Concrete traffic barriers will be installed along Interstate 20 in Van Zandt, Gregg and Smith counties.

Contracts for the safety projects will be let this year and through the spring of 2006, Hall said.

Higher Education Expansions

Some of the largest projects in the East Texas region have been university expansions.

The Texas A&M University System plans to expand its Texarkana campus from a two-year college to a four-year university in 2008 and increase student enrollment from 1,500 to 10,000 over the next two decades.

The school currently has three buildings and shares an 80-acre campus with Texarkana College, but city leaders are hopeful that a new A&M campus will stem the tide of college-bound students who move away from their hometown.

Last year, the city of Texarkana gave the university system a 300-acre site for expansion on the north side of the city. A $17 million science and technology building on campus will be complete in 2006.

Meanwhile, Smith and Van Zandt county voters were headed back to the polls in early February to reconsider a 4-cent tax rate increase for Tyler Junior College. The increase would have helped fund $60 million to $100 million in campus construction and renovation needs over the next decade.

But college regents approved the tax hike without voter approval, and thousands of residents signed a petition demanding a tax-rate-rollback election.