Pay premium to have Spadina subway extension completed quickly, says TTC chair


Insidetoronto.com
March 26, 2015
By Rahul Gupta

Pay a premium and get the Spadina subway extension built as quickly as possible, the TTC’s chair said today.

Josh Colle urged his fellow board members to support staff recommendations brought forth by the TTC aimed at steering the oft-delayed Toronto York Spadina Subway Extension (TYSSE) to completion. The recommendations were part of several options presented to the board in a report released last week on the project’s construction timeline which revealed the northern extension of the Spadina line into Vaughan will take years longer to complete and millions of additional dollars to the $2.6 billion project’s budget.

The report outlines several options for completing the TYSSE but its key recommendation is to finish the subway by late 2017 at a cost of an additional $150-million to be paid by both Toronto as well as York Region.

Also recommended is hiring a third-party manager to deal with eight construction companies and “hundreds” of sub-contractors hired to work on the six-stop extension. While in regular circumstances a Request For Proposal (RFP) bidding process would be initiated. with multiple companies invited to make a bid, the TYSSE report recommends issuing a sole-sourced contract for $35-million to an unidentified company to save time.

Following a noon recess of the TTC’s monthly board meeting taking place at city hall on Thursday, March 26, Colle suggested the board should agree to pay the extra premium to get the subway extension completed in as little time as possible.

“The question becomes about time,” said Colle right after the meeting’s lunch hour recess. ”We’re most certainly paying a premium for time in a lot of these options, but do we want the line open or not? I think there is a great set of reasons why we need to push to get this open.”

During the morning session of the meeting, TTC board members had a chance to question TTC CEO Andy Byford on the report’s findings including the existence of “strained relationships” between TTC personnel and the private-sector contractors.

Byford told Colle the tension, which led to the firing of two senior TTC managers attached to TYSSE, was because of required “design changes” which were objected to by some contractors.

“We have to have the right mindset and attitude that remembers the endgame is to get (TYSSE) open rather than dogmatically stick to the contract,” said Byford.

The board is expected to vote on the TYSEE recommendations later this afternoon.