Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands – With the review of the re-worked cruise pier plans nearing completion, the Ministry of Tourism is seeking to engage consultants with experience in Cruise Lines negotiations to develop the financial modelling aspects of the project and prepare the tender documents required for the construction phase of the cruise berthing facility.

In July 2016 international engineering firm Royal HaskoningDHV was appointed by the Central Tenders Committee to undertake the civil engineering design works related to the piers. “With that process now well advanced information is being developed to better estimate the cost of the piers, which is an important part of the next phase of the project,” said Chief Officer Stran Bodden who is overseeing development of the proposed facility on behalf of the Ministry. “The request for proposal (RFP) notice issued on 5th December, 2016 is therefore seeking to attract consultants to assist the Ministry in developing the contracts for the commercial, financial and legal aspects associated to the project.“

The Ministry is inviting proposals from suitably qualified consultants with specific experience in Concessions and Design-Build-Finance Maintain (DBFM) modelling. In large scale infrastructure projects, DBFM is a type of public-private partnership agreement and is one of the financing frameworks being considered to facilitate construction of the piers.

“What this essentially means is that financing for the project could be obtained or provided by the appointed contractor and would generally include all of the development costs from construction through to completion,” explained Chief Officer Bodden.

Commenting on the development timeline, Hon. Moses Kirkconnell, Minister for Tourism stated “The Ministry of Tourism is confident that repositioning the piers and constructing them in deeper water will minimise dredging and greatly reduce the impact on the environment. While we await the official confirmation and full details of the redesigned plans, the decision has been taken to move ahead with other aspects of the project. The Ministry has been working to an aggressive timeline since the business case was approved by Cabinet in October 2013 and we are keen to maintain that positive forward momentum,” he said.