Spadina extension plagued with problems

Construction of the Spadina subway extension has been plagued with problems that are causing major delays, but one industry expert says the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) was warned about this situation many years ago.

Dailycommercialnews.com
Nov. 20, 2014
By Richard Gilbert

"We have been warning for many years that the process being used to deliver these projects by IO (Infrastructure Ontario), TTC, and Metrolinx was creating an unacceptable risk, that was going to come and bite us at some point in time," said Clive Thurston, Ontario General Contractors Association (OGCA) president.

"We were not listened to. We were told that Ontario has to be open for business and that we can learn from the rest of the world. Welcome to the world we warned you about years ago. You didn't listen, that's the bottom line."

After the release of a progress report on the construction of the Spadina Subway Extension, TTC board chair Maria Augimeri said the city, the transit system and other public agencies need to start selecting contractors with the smartest bid rather than the lowest, on large infrastructure projects.

OHL-FCC GP Canada Inc., a Spanish consortium, submitted the lowest bid of $404.4 million and was awarded the contract in 2010 for the construction of 4.5 kilometres of tunnels at the north end of the new subway and the Highway 407 Station.

OHL's bid was lower than a number of international competitors including Dragados Canada/Ellis Don JV at $409.9 million and Kenaiden/Obayashi/Flatiron JV at $459.7 million.

"It kind of amazes me that people are all of a sudden talking about it (low bid), and discovering that if you pay the lowest bid you are getting what you want," said Thurston.

"This is not new to the industry. We have been supporting the architects and engineers on Quality Based Selection (QBS) for 13 years. There are numerous demonstrations of the value of that system to avoid this exact problem."

Thurston pointed out that there were immediate questions about work on OHL's part of the project, because some of the original team members were dropped by the successful bidder.

During the bidding process, Toronto contractor Buttcon Ltd. was asked by OHL to provide a price for the station portion of the project.

However, after OHL won the contract, they told Buttcon to do the work for a lower price. The company refused.

In addition, OHL completed some of the excavation work for the station, but stopped work on-site in July 2013, so EllisDon could take over.

The negotiation for handover of construction from one contractor to another took much longer than expected.

To avoid this situation in the future, Thurston recommends that QBS should be used as a procurement process for the selection of architectural and engineering services on public construction projects.

QBS is a competitive contract procurement process whereby consulting firms submit qualifications to an owner, who evaluates and selects the most qualified firm, and then negotiates the project scope of work, schedule, budget, and consultant fee.