The Power of Two

The North Texas Rail Group (NTRG) was selected as construction manager/general contractor for a new commuter rail project being built by the Denton County Transit Authority (DCTA). The NTRG is a team that is led by the joint venture of Herzog Contracting Corp (HCC) and Archer Western Contractors. The group also includes an HCC subsidiary, Herzog Transit Services, Inc. (HTSI). The RailDCTA Project, to be known as the ‘A-Train’, is a passenger rail service between Denton and Carrollton in north central Texas. This segment is the first phase of a project that will eventually provide a single seat service from Denton to downtown Dallas.

Notably for the two Herzog companies, they are working together on a new project from the beginning. HCC was established in 1969 and has been in the railroad construction business since 1970. HTSI was founded in 1993 to operate and maintain passenger rail systems. While both companies have been very successful in their respective lines of business, the Denton county project is really what the founders of HTSI, Bill and Stan Herzog, envisioned when they were established – the two companies working together to build, operate and maintain new passenger rail systems.

During the design and construction phases of the project, HTSI, as a subcontractor to NTRG, will advise on the operability and maintainability of the system. HTSI will also assist in the systems integration, testing and acceptance and will ultimately manage the start-up of the new system. The involvement of the operator and maintainer in the early stages of design and construction will ensure a well-designed system that works from the outset without costly redesigns and retrofits.

As CMGC and DBOM projects are growing as the most efficient delivery method for transportation projects, so too is the Herzogs’ vision of HCC and HTSI working together to create efficiently delivered passenger rail systems.