Perini and Skanska begin Coast Guard waterfront jobs worth a combined $586M

The Coast Guard has waterfront construction under way on two coasts, $586 million of it combined. Perini Management Services has started work at Base Kodiak in Alaska, and Skanska has begun replacing the service's homeport pier in Newport, Rhode Island, Construction Dive reported, with Perini's award announced Monday and Skanska's release dated Oct. 2.

The Kodiak release lists unexploded ordnance removal first, then waterfront improvements, a new fueling utility building, utilities, cutter shore ties and other site amenities. Work began last month, and substantial completion is slated for September 2030. The release does not say how the ordnance work is sequenced against the concrete, whether it runs in phases, or what it contributes to the schedule.

The Alaska contract was awarded under accelerated design-build to budget, a method included in the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2026 that integrates design and construction, according to the release. The same release does not say how many firms bid, whether the design phase shortened, or how the award priced against a conventionally let job. That silence matters most for contractors weighing the method: what a delivery approach is worth depends on where it puts risk, and the Kodiak release describes a scope without saying who holds which uncertainty.

A LinkedIn post from the AEC firm Haskell describes a wider pattern behind the method, with military agencies leaning on Other Transaction Authority to compress early stages by asking bidders to answer a stated problem instead of pricing a prescribed scope. The post is one firm's account of procurement practice, not a record of how this solicitation ran.

Skanska's Newport job is the more literal assignment: demolish the existing Pier 1 and build a replacement capable of berthing four offshore patrol cutters, according to its Oct. 2 release. That work has also started, with completion slated for March 2030, roughly six months ahead of Kodiak's date.

Beyond the total, the two jobs share a purpose — shore infrastructure for cutters, with shore ties at Kodiak and berths for four at Newport — and four-year calendars that both run to 2030. The $586 million is a combined figure, and the coverage does not break it out by contract or state a delivery method for Newport. Whether it represents a large share of the Coast Guard's waterfront spending is unconfirmed; the material covers these two awards, with no program total and no comparison job let the traditional way.

At Kodiak the accelerated method carries a design the contractor owns, a budget the Coast Guard set and a September 2030 completion date. Four years from now there will be a result to argue about.