Heavy construction is well underway on RTD FasTracks’ first new rail corridor, the West Corridor light rail through Denver, Lakewood and Golden. In the final installment in our threeday video of quarterly construction progress and near-term look-ahead, Josh Pategas, the area engineer for Denver Transit Construction Group, takes us along Area 1 between the Denver Federal Center and the Jefferson County Government Complex.

Pategas’ area has some of the biggest bridges along the corridor, including the longest, the 1,600-foot snaking bridge over the Sixth Avenue Freeway and Indiana Street. His area also includes two tunnels, one under Interstate 70 where DTCG is using top-down construction — building the bridge within the ground under I-70, then excavating the dirt out from it when the caissons and girders have framed it out.

The Colfax bridge construction is also highlighted.

Edward Kraemer & Sons and Lawrence Construction are the major subcontractors on these significant structures.

The West Corridor is a 12-mile light rail line divided into three areas by the contractor. Denver Transit Construction Group is a partnership of Herzog Contracting of St. Joseph, Mo., and Stacy and Witbeck Inc. of Alameda, Calif.

On Thursday and Friday, Inside Lane took you to Area 3 from downtown Denver to Sheridan Boulevard, and along Area 2 from Sheridan to the federal center. You can still see those tours on our home page.

You can watch the video right here at Inside Lane or click on the little box with four arrows at the bottom right of the screen to expand to full-screen mode at Vimeo.