Rapid transit on track

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This article was published 13/05/2016 (3435 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

 A multi-national firm has been chosen to head up a consortium that will design, build and maintain the second stage of the southwest transit corridor.

Winnipeg city hall announced Friday that the Plenary Roads Winnipeg consortium beat out two other groups to construct the $587-million transit corridor and Pembina Highway Underpass project.

In making the announcement, City Hall also said it was initiating preparations for a second transit corridor by issuing an RFP (request for proposals) for a functional study for the route options for the eastern corridor of the transit network.

“As construction begins on the Southwest Transitway, we need to begin examining the next best route, and this initial work will be undertaken along the eastern corridor which was identified in the Transportation Master Plan as the next priority for rapid transit,” Mayor Brian Bowman said in a prepared statement.

The Plenary Roads Winnipeg group consists of Plenary Group Canada, PCL Constructors Canada Inc., and Alberta Highway Services Limited (a division of ColasCanada Inc). The Plenary Group has been involved in public sector projects across Canada and the United and southeast Asia. Here in Winnipeg, Plenary Group Canada was involved with the construction of the new Disraeli bridges.

The $589-million joint project will be the city’s largest capital project to date. The work is being undertaken as a public-private-partnership, known as a P3, where the consortium will design, construct and maintain the corridor for a 30-year period.

The city’s upfront cost of the project was tabbed at $225 million but its actual cost will reach $600 million as a result of $20-million in annual payments over 30 years, beginning in 2020.

Ottawa is contributing $140 million and the provincial government $225 million.

The corridor project had a price tag of $407.8 million but it was disclosed at the transitway expropriation hearing in November that the cost has climbed to $416.8 million. The overall budget has not changed, however, as the $8.5 million increase in the transit corridor cost is being taken from a contingency fund.

The underpass budget is $72.5 million.

Related drainage work along the corridor route has been budgeted at $39.8 million.

The city built in a contingency budget of $69.4 million — which has already been used to cover the additional $8.5 million for additional links to the Hopewell (Sugar Beet) project, additional work needed for bus staging at the U of M campus, and public art to be placed along the corridor route —  but that has now been reduced to $60.9 million.

While the city has chosen a route for the southwest corridor linking Jubilee to the U of M Fort Garry campus, final design work will be done by the Plenary consortium.

Construction is expected to begin later this summer, with completion by late 2019. The corridor is expected to go operational in early 2020 following a testing period.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca