History
Although a tunnel connecting the Port of Miami to Watson Island was first proposed in the 1980s, when the House rejected President Ronald Reagan's attempt to veto the bill to conduct a premilinary study and called it a "pork-barrel" project, when the port was only connected to the mainland by a two-lane drawbridge (the current six lane elevated bridge was built in the early 1990s), it was not until 2006 that the tender for the tunnel project was ready to be launched and December 2007 that the project was approved by City Commission. However, the economic crisis resulted in a cancellation of the project in December 2008 by one of the sponsors, Babcock & Brown, and the State of Florida. Despite this, in April 2009, following intense lobbying by Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez, to avoid a new tender that would delay even further the start of construction, the project was reinstated. Port director Bill Johnson has also played a key role in supporting the Port of Miami infrastructure projects, as well as developing a free-trade pact with Colombia. Altogether, the port infrastructure projects have an estimated cost of around two billion dollars.
Prior to 2008, the project had been estimated at a total cost of $3.1 billion USD, however the revised project has an estimated cost of $1 billion USD (The difference in estimates partially due to differences in previous tunnel designs). Financial closing on the project was reached in October, 2009. Miami-Dade County is expected to contribute $402 million, the city of Miami contributing $50 million, and the state giving $650 million to build, operate and maintain it. Those contributions are spread during construction and operation of the tunnel project. During construction, 90% of the funds are provided by the private sector. Of the estimated one billion dollar total project cost, 607 million it said to go to design and construction, 195.1 million to financing, 59.6 million to insurance and maintenance during construction, 41.2 million to reserves, and 209.8 million for state development cost.
Read more about this topic: Port Of Miami Tunnel
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