Skanska Lands $1B Contract to Replace Boston's 95-Year-Old Rail Bridges
The design-build contract will replace a pair of historic bascule bridges with three vertical-lift spans.
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The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority has awarded Skanska a $1 billion contract to replace the nearly 100-year-old North Station Draw One Bridge in northern Boston over the Charles River.
Officially titled the North Station Draw One Bridge Replacement and Associated Track and Signal Upgrades project, the new structure will be expanded from four to six commuter rail tracks and get a new station platform.
The design-build contract will replace the existing pair of historic bascule bridges with three vertical-lift spans, upgrade approach trestles, construct a new Tower A control facility, and support the addition of a new Platform F at North Station. Additionally, Skanska will upgrade integrated track, signal and Positive Train Controls and connect the new spans to the 11 and 12 tracks inside North Station.
Skanska plans to use Alternative Technical Concepts to reduce in-water work, improve safety and minimize service disruptions to the over 100,000 daily users of MBTA’s north-side network. Work will begin this month and is expected to wrap up in Fall 2032.
The four-track North Station Draw One Bridge structure carries the Haverhill, Lowell, Newburyport/Rockport, and Fitchburg Commuter Rail lines from northern Boston into Cambridge and Somerville. The two original drawbridges opened to rail traffic in 1931, stretch 92 feet over the Charles River, and, according to MBTA, were the first moving railroad drawbridges built in the U.S.
The new contract follows another project Skanska won on the other side of the country: replacing the deck of the Los Angeles Vincent Thomas Bridge.
