L.A.'s Light-Rail Fiasco
How rail service to the Westside jumped the track
Thorpe maintains that the contract method was not to blame for the project's woes. The cost escalation, he said, was primarily due to higher materials costs and elements that were added to the project late. Those costs would not have been any lower with a more traditional design-build approach, he argues.
"I call this the perfect storm," he says. "I've been in this business 35 years. I've delivered 10 light-rail projects, all on time and under budget. This one has been a tough one, and it's been a tough one for a whole lot of reasons. ... It's probably been the most stressful time in my career."
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Expo is not using "negotiated design-build" on Phase 2. Instead, it will go back to plain-vanilla design-build. The MTA is not planning to use Thorpe's innovative approach on any of the dozen projects funded by Measure R.
Thorpe, meanwhile, plans to stay on to build the Expo extension to Santa Monica.
"My contract was supposed to be over," he says. "I've never had this happen to me before. I want to go out on a high note."
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