The Confederation Line consortium told the city within weeks of the Rideau Street breakthrough in June 2016 that it was unlikely to meet its LRT transmission deadline, a public investigation into the Ottawa Light Rail said on Friday.
But instead, the city insisted on an extremely aggressive – and possibly unrealistic – catch-up plan, said Antonio Estrada, who was CEO of Rideau Transit Group (RTG) from 2013 to 2018.
On June 8, 2016, a hole in front of the Rideau Center engulfed three lanes of the roadway, taking with it a parked van and giant construction equipment, although no one was injured.
Less than two weeks later, Estrada sent a letter to the city’s then director of railways, Steve Cripps, to say that the diarrhea “could affect” the date RTG was supposed to deliver the city’s LRT system.
And on September 16, 2016, Estrada rewrote Cripps, this time saying that RTG’s construction arm, called OLRT Constructors (OLRT-C), predicted that the project would be five months late.
Christine Mainville, co-chair of the commission of inquiry, asked Estrada why the city and RTG did not postpone the completion date, when it became clear that May 24, 2018 may be impossible to meet.
Antonio Estrada, who was CEO of Rideau Transit Group from 2013 to 2018, testified on Friday that the city knew it was unlikely that the LRT would be completed on time within weeks of the June 2016 sinking (Kate Porter / CBC)
“I don’t think the city wanted to hear about the delays in the first talks with the city. The city wanted us to recover. In the end, RTG agreed to try to recover and draw up a recovery plan, which I thought was very aggressive. “
Estrada said the city is probably aware that the new schedule will be difficult to achieve.
“The recovery plan created by OLRT-C was very aggressive, probably not impossible, but in a situation like this, in order to recover, everything has to go almost perfectly,” he said in an inquiry. “And that doesn’t usually happen.”
Cripps told CBC in November 2016 that he was not worried about the deadline because the company had told the city that it was “building a mitigation schedule so that they [could] finish on time. “
As early as the spring of 2017, the city authorities – in particular the former head of OC Transpo John Manconi – refused to say what date of delivery is specified in the contract, not to mention whether it can be met.
But all the while, the city knew that LRT builders were struggling to cope.
Estrada told the commission conducting the investigation on Friday that RTG knows that they will not make the day of the broadcast on May 24, 2018 until next summer.
Dispute over the date of completion
RTG has only 50 meters of excavation left in the 2.5-kilometer tunnel in the city center when the hole occurred. Estrada said the sinkhole is particularly discouraging, as designers have already successfully completed Rideau’s so-called “cave” – the giant hole dug for the future Rideau station – which is considered the most complex part of the project.
City and OLRT Constructors worked together to fill the gap on June 8, 2016 on Rideau near Sussex Drive and reopen it for east-west cyclists two weeks later. (Andrew Foote / CBC)
In the first few days after the breakthrough, RTG and the city worked well together to secure the area and reopen Rideau Street, Estrada said.
Both partners agreed to postpone any lawsuits or financial disputes while both sides investigate the root causes of the breach. The city even agreed to cut an RTG check for its final payment to complete the excavation of the tunnel, even if it is 50 meters away.
These warm feelings did not last.
(The city and RTG would argue over who was to blame for the abyss. City experts believe the tunnel probably caused it, while RTG said it was a faulty city water supply. Now the two are sue each other for huge sums due to delays.)
RTG and its designers exchanged tense and often confusing letters about when the LRT would be completed. In its opening statement to the investigation, the city accused the builders of not being candid about its progress.
“RTG has chosen to insist (even publicly) that it will meet the deadlines that its own leaders now seem to have known were unrealistic at the time,” the city said in a statement. “RTG failed to reveal to the city the true nature of OLRT-C’s progress in its work schedules, which were inaccurate and unrealistic.”
The first delay in the project was officially announced in December 2017
New date set on the basis of the 2018 municipal elections
In early 2018, the director of the Krips city railway wrote to Estrada that “it is clear that the countries must work together to achieve a common goal of [a completion date] on time in accordance with a work schedule that is both realistic and provides reasonable assurance of success. “
But the new proposed date seems to have been affected by political considerations.
The minutes of a meeting of the RTG board on February 28, 2018, which were announced during the investigation on Friday, showed that the builders of LRT proposed a new date for transmission on August 31, 2018, but politicians wanted it to go through municipal elections this fall.
“The city does not want to accept that [date] due to political risk, if not achieved, “the minutes of the board meeting said.” The city’s preference is for the date of the RSA, which is after the municipal elections on October 22. “
The new transmission date is set for November 2, 2018, but this date has been missedas well as a number of subsequent targets. The city took control of the Confederate line on August 31, 2019.
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