BergCM was proud to accept the CMAA’s Project of the Year 2013 award for the Union Station Platform 7 project on March 27, 2013 at the L.A. Live Marriott in Downtown Los Angeles.  Project Manager Cass Hamvas was instrumental towards delivering a project worthy of this acclaim with her exceptional navigation through the challenge of the original contractor defaulting midway through construction.  The partnership BergCM fostered between Metrolink, Metrolink’s legal counsel, the original contractor’s bonding company and the takeover contractor was a testament to what partnering is all about.  We gratefully share this award with the many team members and stakeholders that contributed to the success of this project, most notably these project all-stars:

                                       Stuart Chuck, Project Manager, Metrolink                                     

Nigel Chalmers, Project Manager, Kemp Brothers Construction

Truc Moore, Los Angeles County Counsel

Richard Tropp, Benchmark, representing Arch Insurance

Other construction challenges included performing drilled pile and lagging shoring within 15 feet of a heavily used operating railroad track.  Work was carefully scheduled so as not to affect train schedules or interfere with public activity at the Station.  Pile excavation was 25 feet deep with very little leeway for error due to the Metro Red Line tunnel existing just 15 feet beyond that.  During the drilling of 100 piles, various random objects were discovered as digging unearthed remnants of Old Chinatown, long buried under Union Station’s first construction in 1939. 

The Platform 7 project is an outstanding team achievement due to the combined effort of every partner involved which resulted in high quality craftsmanship worthy of L.A.’s first class transportation hub and community jewel, Union Station.