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

WestEndWebber said:
I can't wait for the City to announce a murale/graffiti art style contest for these piers to try and mask the frankensteins that they have become (not to say they were esthetically pleasing to begin with).


Let the good times roll!
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They need to remain as is in order to serve as reminder. At least that is the stage of grief I have entered.
 
Airboy said:
Was out for a ride yesterday, and noticed the piers for the river crossing are also being done. I thought those were not affected but I guess I was wrong.
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To be clear, the piers that are affected are in the lead up to the bridge and are the same design as at Davies. The actual piers for the bridge over the river are a different design and are not affected.
 
^Do we know what firm was responsible for the structural engineering for Transed, specifically for the viaducts? It looks like Arup was the main engineer for the line as a whole, but I'm wondering how much of that was farmed out to specialists or smaller firms, akin to how the Tawatina was. Like, who was the engineering firm that actually stamped the drawings for those piers? would something like that have trickled down to a local firm at all? I'm worried about the viaduct pier engineer having other projects out there that are also insufficient.
 
Seamusmuldrew said:
Transed now saying pier repair progress is 85% complete as of December 8th. It was 75% on the 1st so if they aren’t pulling these numbers out of their behinds they should be done repairs before the end of the month. Every cell in my body doubts that’ll be the case, but I’m wondering what comes after the repairs are finished? Is anyone familiar with the quality assurance process required before they’re put into service and how long that might take?
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85% of what? Just the piers? Looks like wiring/signals are also being worked on. How much more repair work besides the piers is still outstanding?

Airboy said:
Was out for a ride yesterday, and noticed the piers for the river crossing are also being done. I thought those were not affected but I guess I was wrong.
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they did say the bridge piers were not impacted, the approach piers sure have been repaired though. Yeah, splitting hairs, they're good at that
 
cliffapotamus said:
^Do we know what firm was responsible for the structural engineering for Transed, specifically for the viaducts? It looks like Arup was the main engineer for the line as a whole, but I'm wondering how much of that was farmed out to specialists or smaller firms, akin to how the Tawatina was. Like, who was the engineering firm that actually stamped the drawings for those piers? would something like that have trickled down to a local firm at all? I'm worried about the viaduct pier engineer having other projects out there that are also insufficient.
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TransEd Partners – TransEd Valley Line LRT

transedlrt.ca transedlrt.ca
Bechtel.
 
A bit more in the way of trains running today....
WPE has finished up in Mill Woods and the Bonnie Doon area by the looks of it. Now their work area appears to be from the top of Connors Road/ 95 Ave through to the Muttart. Their GMC cabover spool truck which apparently had some sort of cable pulling gear was at one end of the station, and a pick up truck and tent set up at the other end. Catenary was de-energized with grounding cables at the north end of Muttart and east of the section isolators at Connors Road, meaning that 95 Ave through Strathern was energized. I also spotted a WPE hi-rail bucket line truck on the LRT halfway down Connors Road, so, possible catenary issues being dealt with here now.
There was a 2 car train at Strathern, and a 2 car train at Bonnie Doon. I didn't see either move mind you, but, sometimes they spend their sweet time doing not much. I did definitely see crews on the Strathern train. Security truck near the Strathern Station, so, presumably train storage has moved to Strathern from Muttart.
There was also a single car? train running Downtown. This train would be now be isolated from the other northside cars due to the catenary being deenergized.
I was pleasantly surprised to see a train from close to the south end of the elevated section pace my 73 to Mill Woods TC.

Certainly a lot better looking that last week with the elevated section and Connors Road - Muttart not in use, although on the other hand, WPE hadn't previously been doing work with cables/ wiring/ duct banks/ catenary in the Muttart area. It does make you wonder if WPE has mistakes to fix along the whole line, which seemingly might still including Strathern/ Holyrood, Connors Road, and Downtown.

Also curious about the pink/ grey signage that appeared around the crossovers. I'm thinking they are intended to be a visual reminder to check switch points given the Switch Position Indicators don't appear to be functioning. SPI's were never a thing on the NE LRT when it opened until the signal upgrades of the 2010's, so, it's not high of my list of concerns for the Valley Line. Although I'm sure it is a non-compliant with what is to be delivered. Although, it does highlight yet another feature that wasn't ready to for a "summer 2022" opening and it has taken them until December to seemingly to come up with a temporary fix.
 
I think the sad part of the overall valley line south delay is you'd think that the podiums should have been the only things needed to be worked on. Unfortunately during the podium delays, there has been plenty of other work being done throughout the entire valley line south. To me this shows a significant issue with TransEd that they were far far more behind and probably far more unorganized then they led everyone to believe.
 
Edmcowboy11 said:
Unfortunately during the podium delays, there has been plenty of other work being done throughout the entire valley line south. To me this shows a significant issue with TransEd that they were far far more behind and probably far more unorganized then they led everyone to believe.
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I'm glad someone else has noticed this as well. Driving along most of the line every day and seeing the various activities makes me wonder if they would have met their summer 2022 opening time if the piers weren't to blame.

It seems with transed they pick the biggest issue and blame it for as long as they possibly can and gloss over the smaller items. There have been doing significant work on the signalling system as well as the catenary but there has been nothing in the reports/updates about it.
 
awstott said:
I'm glad someone else has noticed this as well. Driving along most of the line every day and seeing the various activities makes me wonder if they would have met their summer 2022 opening time if the piers weren't to blame.

It seems with transed they pick the biggest issue and blame it for as long as they possibly can and gloss over the smaller items. There have been doing significant work on the signalling system as well as the catenary but there has been nothing in the reports/updates about it.
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Well noted by people in this forum. It surprises me (or maybe it doesn't unfortunately) that the media doesn't have someone digging into this story more because it's very obvious a lot of work is still going on outside of the piers.
 
Some good investigative journalism could provide some great material on this no doubt. Certainly many factors of which the piers were just one of that have led to further delays. Construction started April 2016 and was slated to open December 2020 AKA ~ 56 months build time. We are now delayed 24 months with the delay very likely ending up being at least half (28) the original build time. Would be fascinating to see the financials on this thing for TransEd.
 
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