Award: Light rail project
Value: $1.9 billion
Location: Van Nuys, California
Client: LA Metro
A Skanska-Stacy Witbeck joint venture has won an infrastructure megaproject in Southern California’s San Fernando Valley.
The project team has signed a $1.9 billion contract with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority for a light rail transit project in Van Nuys, Skanska announced. The Stockholm-based builder’s share of the contract is $957 million, per the announcement, indicating a roughly even split with Alameda, California-based Stacy Witbeck. Along with preconstruction the total contract value for the project is $2.4 billion, according to a release from Stacy Witbeck.
Project scope includes constructing 6.7 miles of at-grade light rail line along Van Nuys Boulevard in addition to a 26-acre rail and maintenance facility. The JV will also develop 11 new stations including shade structures and utility improvements.
"Delivering the East San Fernando Valley Light Rail requires getting every detail right, from utility coordination through revenue service, across some of the most active urban corridors in Los Angeles,” Eric Meisgeier, project manager at Stacy Witbeck, said in its release on the project. “We will construct this project with the same focus on the work and respect for the community that defines how our team operates on every project."
The East San Fernando Valley Light Rail Transit Project expands LA Metro’s transit system, connecting it to the existing G-Line bus route.
The contractors are no strangers to rail construction in the region.
In May, a Skanska Traylor Shea JV concluded work on the 10-year, $2.2 billion Los Angeles D Line Subway Extension. Unlike the ground-level light rail build, that project required significant tunneling in a region prone to seismic activity. It required careful coordination in response to pockets of dangerous gasses as well as massive ice age fossils.
Meanwhile, heavy civil builder Stacy Witbeck counts many rail projects in its portfolio, such as the SMART Commuter Rail line station built in Petaluma, California, in 2025. The project’s scope included 6 miles of pedestrian pathway adjacent to the track.
Work has begun on the light rail project and completion is expected in December 2031.
