Public procurement notice: Modification Of A Contract/Concession During Its Term
Published: 2021-12-15
Buyer: National Highways
Country: UK
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Restricted procedure
CPV classification: 71310000 | 71311000: Civil engineering consultancy services | 71320000 | 71500000

Technical requirements: The Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) is a new road crossing of the Thames Estuary, east of London, between Essex and Kent with new infrastructure and operational arrangements to increase capacity and improve resilience on the Strategic Road Network. The existing Dartford-Thurrock crossing provides a vital link for many business travellers, haulage companies and holidaymakers travelling to and from Europe via the English Channel, as well as linking communities both north and south of the Thames. However, over recent years traffic volumes have increased and the crossing now regularly exceeds its original design capacity of 135 000 vehicles a day. Congestion and delay are major problems, and conditions are expected to get worse in future. Therefore the Lower Thames Crossing scheme is exploring 2 options to relieve the stress on this link. The LTC is a technically challenging project and although the crossing type and location will not be decided until early 2016, we are looking for a Technical Partner to provide leading expertise in the key disciplines outlined below in order to ensure successful delivery of this high profile project. This project gives a potential supplier the chance to be involved in a team who are working to deliver a 2 500 000 000 GBP - 5 000 000 000 GBP scheme which will be 1 of Highway England's biggest projects. The Technical Partner will need to demonstrate extensive experience in the development and delivery of large complex transport infrastructure schemes in the current UK planning environment. This includes being able to provide strong leadership, excellent technical capability and proven expertise in the design of and construction of large bridges, immersed tube and bored tunnels. This is a long term appointment, likely to be in excess of 10 years, and required to support an accelerated delivery schedule. The successful Technical Partner will be required to work in collaboration with multiple partners to; - Provide and demonstrate expertise in all relevant river crossing types in order to accelerate the delivery schedule and able to provide all required capabilities without compromise. - Provide design leadership and technical expertise in the preparation of preliminary designs (including surveys and sampling), Environmental Impact assessments (EIA) and other technical documentation to support an application for the relevant permissions / consents. - Manage the pre-application engagement with the Planning Inspectorate (PIN) and develop / manage the application (likely to be a Development Consent Order (DCO)) including technical stakeholder engagement and pre application consultation process. - Progress the procurement of its works contractor or multiple contractors in parallel with the completion and submission of a DCO application. Provide a seamless transition in to delivery immediately following award of the DCO and the associated consents. - Provide assurance, supervision and coordination of the activities of contractors. - Ensure liaison with Network Operations and assure the technical elements of the Delivery Phase ( Design and Construction). - Develop illustrative / reference design proposals to enable procurement of 1 or more main contractors and essential advanced or enabling works regardless of the procurement or funding route.
The Technical Partner Tender is to be let under the Terms of the NEC3 Professional Services Contract (Option G) as adopted/modified by the Highways England.
The Contract will be advertised via OJEU (Restricted Procedure) and suppliers will be shortlisted following prequalification.
Highways England will incorporate a minimum 10 day standstill period at the point information on award of the contract is communicated to tenderers. Appeals should be lodged in accordance with the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (SI 2006 No 5) as amended.
The Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) is a new road crossing of the Thames Estuary, east of London, between Essex and Kent with new infrastructure and operational arrangements to increase capacity and improve resilience on the Strategic Road Network. The existing Dartford-Thurrock crossing provides a vital link for many business travellers, haulage companies and holidaymakers travelling to and from Europe via the English Channel, as well as linking communities both north and south of the Thames. However, over recent years traffic volumes have increased and the crossing now regularly exceeds its original design capacity of 135 000 vehicles a day. Congestion and delay are major problems, and conditions are expected to get worse in future. The LTC is a technically challenging project and we are looking for a Technical Partner to provide leading expertise in the key disciplines outlined below in order to ensure successful delivery of this high profile project. This project gives a potential supplier the chance to be involved in a team who are working to deliver a £5.3 to £6.8bn scheme which will be one of National Highways’ biggest projects. The Technical Partner will need to demonstrate extensive experience in the development and delivery of large complex transport infrastructure schemes in the current UK planning environment. This includes being able to provide strong leadership, excellent technical capability and proven expertise in the design of and construction of large bridges, immersed tube and bored tunnels. This is a long term appointment, and is required to support an accelerated delivery schedule. The successful Technical Partner will be required to work in collaboration with multiple partners to; - Provide and demonstrate expertise in all relevant river crossing types in order to accelerate the delivery schedule and able to provide all required capabilities without compromise. - Provide design leadership and technical expertise in the preparation of preliminary designs (including surveys and sampling), Environmental Impact assessments (EIA) and other technical documentation to support an application for the relevant permissions / consents. - Manage the pre-application engagement with the Planning Inspectorate (PIN) and develop / manage the application (likely to be a Development Consent Order (DCO)) including technical stakeholder engagement and pre-application consultation process. - Progress the procurement of its works contractor or multiple contractors in parallel with the completion and submission of a DCO application. Provide a seamless transition in to delivery immediately following award of the DCO and the associated consents. - Provide assurance, supervision and coordination of the activities of contractors. - Ensure liaison with Network Operations and assure the technical elements of the Delivery Phase (Design and Construction). - Develop illustrative / reference design proposals to enable procurement of 1 or more main contractors and essential advanced or enabling works regardless of the procurement or funding route.
The original OJEU published in 2015 had a value (excluding VAT) of £100m- £200m and the core scope of works included delivering public consultations, completing the design to support the Development Consent Order (DCO), preparing the main works contracts for procurement and providing technical assurance during construction. A further modification notice (reference: 2020/S 100-243392) was published 20/05/2020 to increase the contract value by £100million.  This increase was due to a requirement to extent the quantum of services reflecting the impact of the final route option, a delay in the preferred route announcement, the scale of DCO responses and delay in the DCO submission. The Technical Partner built up a substantial knowledge of the scheme issues on a wide range of including local engagement, ground conditions, environmental factors, utility diversions, traffic modelling and planning issues. The contract remained the only practical vehicle for the project to retain the technical and management resources required for the project to submit the DCO.
The Integration Partner (IP) contract was awarded in March 2021. A portion of the non-technical services originally awarded to the Technical Partner will be transferred to be delivered by the Integration Partner. However, given the technical knowledge that has been embedded in the DCO and design process so far by the Technical Partner, and noting that the IP contract is not intended for design/development consent, most of the consenting development activities need to stay with the Technical Partner.
In November 2020 the Lower Thames Crossing DCO application was withdrawn, therefore this modification is to cover the Technical Partner’s support which is required to deliver the reapplication of the DCO.
In accordance with regulation 72(1)(c) it is necessary to procure additional services as a continuation of the original scope from Cascade to complete the DCO.  National Highways could not have foreseen the need for withdrawal of the DCO having been through a robust process following industry standards and governance from both within and external to the project team with the reasonable expectation that any risks to the ability to gain consent were not unusual for a submission version and could be addressed through the examination. Cascade have built up a detailed understanding of the project and any change would mean significant inconvenience, duplication of costs and material risk. This would mean that the DCO could not be obtained within the required timescales and/or the procurement would be materially delayed.


Winner: Cascade made up of CH2M Hill UK / Hyder Consulting (UK) Ltd / COWI A/S JV