Governors Island sues Turner Construction over allegedly shoddy work

The Trust for Governors Island is suing Turner Construction and one of the company’s subcontractors for more than $5 million for their allegedly less-than-stellar work on the island’s seawalls and bridges, DNAInfo reports.

Governors Island has a long-standing contract with Turner, a leading player in the city’s construction landscape: since 2009, the company has been in charge of choosing subcontractors and supervising work for various development projects around the island.

But that relationship appears to be souring. According to the suit filed last week, Turner is “responsible for choosing a subcontractor that made numerous errors in its designs to overhaul the island's seawall and build new lift bridges.” The suit also accuses the subcontractor in question—Ocean and Coastal Consultants Engineering (OCC)—of “professional malpractice” for its alleged design errors on several of the island’s bridges and flawed plans to revamp the island’s seawall.

As a result, the island says it was stuck fixing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of work. Among the many problems: inaccurate ferry measurements, which lead to gaps between the ferry and the bridge; poorly designed connectors between the bridge and the boat dock that caused bolts “to shear off”; and ill-conceived bumpers, which were made from the wrong materials and had to be replaced.

Meanwhile, the plans to redo the seawall were so catastrophic that “no marine contractor would be able to rehabilitate the seawall as specified by OCC,” the suit claims. The island was then left to pick up the tab for a whole different design.

Governors Island wants at least $2.4 million from both companies, plus lawyer’s fees. Turner Construction and OCC did not “immediately reply” to DNAInfo’s requests for comment, while Governors Island declined to weigh in.

• Governors Island Sues Turner Construction For Poor Work on Seawall, Bridges [DNA Info]