Four make cut in Carson City project chase

Designs from four consulting firms for a streetscape makeover in downtown Carson City cleared an initial hurdle, city government officials said Tuesday.

The four companies, among five seeking the nod to do the mostly publicly-financed project, are Stantec, Resource Concepts, Inc. (RCI), Lumos & Associates and Atkins, according to Public Works Director Darren Schulz and Transportation Manager Patrick Pittenger. Pittenger said interviews with representatives of those firms will be Tuesday.

A city team review of proposals led to the decision and the interviews won’t be public, but are part of a screening process that will lead to a recommendation, with the four proposals unveiled at that point.

The announcement means CFA, a fifth firm that had made a submission after a city request for proposals, didn’t advance to the interview stage. RCI and Lumos have local offices and all three of the others submitting proposals have Reno offices. Schulz earlier said the firms named are lead consultants in combination submissions involving joint ventures to handle various facets of the makeover.

Designs sought were for narrowing the number of vehicular traffic lanes, altering pedestrian and bicycle use patterns to bring a “complete streets” concept to bear on Carson Street downtown, as well as to provide a plaza on a block of West 3rd Street, which will be closed, and to upgrade Curry Street in a subsequent phase. The plaza would be between Carson and Curry streets.

City officials say the Carson Street portion includes overdue underground utility work and the above ground amenities with widened sidewalks and bike lanes based on a previous conceptual plan. The overall project, according to the city’s request for proposals, would cost approximately $10 million or $11 million.

The bulk of the funding will be based on bonding from the one-eighth of a penny city sales tax hike passed earlier in 2014 for various capital projects and from Public Works money to do the underground work.