Project Overview
NTH was retained by the Harbor Transit Authority for this 5-year, As-Needed Engineering and Environmental Services Contract. The first Task Assignment for this project was to work with the Harbor Transit Authority (HTA) to identify a land parcel for the construction of a new HTA Administration and Maintenance Facility to replace their outdated and too small existing facilities. As a key part of this $25M project, NTH was tasked with performing all requisite NEPA investigations resulting in either a Categorical Exclusion (CE) or Environmental Assessment (EA) Document acceptable for FTA approval of the needed funding. During future construction of the new facility, NTH’s team will perform material testing of all construction materials used in its construction.
Project Scope
NEPA investigations for the acquisition of property to be funded by federal monies (here Federal Transit Administration) include evaluation of a potential site for impacts to existing wetlands, existing threatened or endangered species, cultural resources (historic architectural elements, archaeological sites, pre-historic archaeological sites) hazardous materials contamination, noise impacts, air-quality impacts, Social Impacts, as well as traditional engineering impacts.
As we began our investigation, the client needs us to expedite our investigation as the property identified was being pursued for purchase by another entity. NTH quickly mobilized to delineate the impacts most critical for the environmental documentation to allow the client to receive a “protective acquisition order” from FTA and prevent the parcel from being purchased without HTA’s involvement and first right of refusal.
Client Benefit
Harbor Transit needed NTH to expediate investigations to allow them to block the purchase of the desired property by another entity. We quickly mobilized our team to perform the necessary investigations so HTA could provide this data to FTA who issued a protective acquisition order to block the other party from purchasing the property while HTA went through the NEPA documentation. NTH’s ability to quickly determine the NEPA impacts on the proposed parcel, allowed HTA to acquire the protective order from FTA and maintain first rights to purchase the property they had identified. Without our quick action, HTA may have lost years on the construction of the new administration and maintenance building schedule.
