Valley Line LRT | ?m | ?s | City of Edmonton

[Edmcowboy11]

And meanwhile no statements from TransEd about all the concrete problems.

 

[The_Cat]

Cases in point:

 

[trevorhayden]

So they're using the same stuff I use to patch holes in my wall? A bit alarming.

 

[Glenco]

So they're using the same stuff I use to patch holes in my wall? A bit alarming.

How can you tell?

 

[The_Cat]

I wonder what they've done with the piers in the third picture (Wagner/Davies Road).

 

[cliffapotamus]

I saw a bunch of work done on one of the piers east of 75 Street at the CN rail crossing. Also, the tarps and scaffolding are down north of Davies Station.

Closeup photos from tonight. These are the piers between the parking lot and 75 St, in that median between the SUP and road. Yes, those are box nails plugging the holes.

The piers on Wagner road just have more testing equipment on them. It looks pretty minimal, given how extensive the scaffolding etc was.

 

[IanO]

Or an epoxy injection point.

 

[IanO]

Walking to the Valley Line LRT | Urban Affairs

The talk around the southeast LRT has been about delays, cracked pillars and a car-sized chunk of concrete found in the North Saskatchewan River.

urbanaffairs.ca

 

[cliffapotamus]

Or an epoxy injection point.

Lol i was just making an idle comment about the choice of materials. Given the effort put in to scaffolding and enclosing some piers, and the amount of patching and monitoring on this pier (this is the one that’s had the survey marker on it for the last few weeks), and the overall ‘scientific exploration’ happening, i just thought it was funny that these holes were plugged with nails from home depot. You can pull them out and put them back and they don’t seal. I’m sure it’s fine, I just thought it looked funny.
But yes, it’s likely they are for epoxy.

 

[archited]

The material applied to the cracks is most likely Ultra High Toughness Cementitious Composite or UHTCC which, when properly bonded, will make the crack area stronger than the adjacent non-cracked area.
The hoarding and enclosure was simply meant to keep foreign particles from settling in the new composite.

 

[kcantor]

^

which may well reinforce/repair the original point of failure but, as far as I know, it still won’t eliminate the cause of the failure.

and without eliminating the cause of the failure, it will simply reoccur at the next weakest point.

but, as previously acknowledged, i’m not an engineer, I’m just a dumb developer.

 

[archited]

^^^^ Ken, it may not be a structural system failure at all -- that may have been the determination (I don't know). If the cracks reappear in new locations after continued testing, then that is a concern.

 

[awstott]

Western Pacific truick parked near the 41 Ave crossovers. Grounding cables on both tracks on each side of the truck. Again with more stuff that would cause a shutdown if the line was actually operating but we hear nothing from Transed???

 

[The_Cat]

I sometimes wonder if some of the concrete repairs are a cover for addressing electrical repairs.

 

[EdwardEdm]

I sometimes wonder if some of the concrete repairs are a cover for addressing electrical repairs.

The piers themselves are certainly not a cover for addressing any electrical repairs.
As myself, and others have said though, TransEd used the concrete in the river, delaying the construction of the bridge, as an excuse for far too long.
So, not withstanding the piers, the remaining work that is being addressed by TransEd and their contractors needs to be looked at as to how it would affect operations.
There are a few levels to this.
1. No interference with trains operations.
2. Overnight work when no trains are running, no effect on operations
3. Slow orders/ single tracking, no service reduction
4. Reduction in service to facilitate repairs
- could be to allow single tracking either all the time, or at off peak times
- could be ending service early and replacing with buses either in the evening, or all weekend, maintaining service M-F from start of service until after the PM peak.
5. Service outright stopped and fully replaced by buses.

An example of #1 would be coloured concrete repairs at Bonnie Doon right now.
An possible example of #3 could be concrete repairs in Strathern. Since the concrete being replaced goes right up to the edge of the northernmost rail, a slow order might be needed during the day, and when crews are working on the concrete, trains might need to single track.
It's entirely possible that some of the other work (wiring in Mill Woods) could be scheduled overnight when trains aren't running, or facilitated with single tracking.
On the other hand, it could also be that the work is significant enough the line wouldn't be able to run in Mill Woods. The problem is we don't really know what is happening up until the past few days. All we knew was that the wires leading out of Gerry Wright to the mainline seemed to be de-energized, given the presence of grounding cables.
Since then, Awstott has reported work on signals and today what I spotted makes things interesting.
Western Pacific Enterprises (WPE) as done all of the electrical work on the line, catenary and civilian.
WPE has a truck loaded with a spool or wire sitting on the northbound track south of 38 Ave.
WPE had 2 hi-rail pickup trucks on the tracks near Gerry Wright, one towing a trailer with a manlift strapped to it, one of the configurations they used to put up the catenary.
WPE had their uninsulated platform line truck parked along the right of way.
WPE had a truck at the Mill Woods Town Centre substation.
Both the manlift and platform line truck are not insulated, so cannot be used around energized wire. It makes me wonder how much of Mill Woods is even energized. Although I usually look for the grounding cables as a sign power is off, it's possible they are only installing them near worksites.
The grounding cables at Gerry Wright are on the mainline side, so, I guess power will could be on to the Gerry Wright yard tracks, although I haven't seen anything in the yard in the last month. Barricades were added recently however to the leads to the mainline. Before it was just the pair of grounding cables.

Although it is probably a happy coincidence for TransEd that they need to complete this other work, it's tough to say how much this electrical work could have affected potential LRT operations. The further delays for opening have probably made it more convenient by not having to rush the work, and, it can be done M-F, 9-5.
We'll see in the coming days what happens with the line truck/ manlifts and everything else.