Belmar Council To Decide $1.4M More For Boardwalk After Redesign Issue

Belmar's Boardwalk is expected to cost $1.4 million more than the original bid after an engineer's original design was changed.

The cost of a diagonal board layout, accounting for areas wider than 25-feet  not in the original bid, and ramps that better accommodate wheelchairs, will add $1,401,651.55 to the original $6.59 million cost of rebuilding Belmar's boardwalk.

The change order is part of the March 13 council agenda. The Belmar Borough Council will now meet March 13 after a nor'easter canceled Wednesday's scheduled meeting.

The borough's engineer for the project, Birdsall Engineering Group, explained the increased cost for not factoring in wider sections, saying the original bid was made with a "standard" 25-feet width. However, portions of Belmar's boardwalk are wider than 25 feet. Using 25 feet, Birdsall said in a prepared statement, was to "take advantage of pricing" and for materials availability.

"In an effort to bid the project immediately to take advantage of pricing, help ensure that materials would be available and to complete the boardwalk prior to the 2013 summer season, the plans included in the  bid set provided for a 25’ typical section for the bidders use.  In some sections the boardwalk will actually be wider and in other sections narrower. The 25’ was used for as a typical section for bidding purposes. We anticipated that there would be change orders in a job of this type and size. The overall bid was based upon a total area of 215,000 square feet which remains unchanged."

Most of the agenda from Wednesday is expected to be held to the March 13 meeting. Proposals included an increase to the cost of the boardwalk after the engineer factored in a new pattern to lay decking and better accomodate ramps for those in wheelchairs.

Several other items of business for the rebuilding of Belmar after Hurricane Sandy were also proposed on the agenda, such as the bid for lighting the boardwalk, street repair and more.

Council is scheduled to meet 6 p.m. March 13. in borough hall, 601 Main Street.

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