$8.2 billion

2012 Ranking: 1

2011 Ranking: 4

Sector: LRT

Location: Toronto, Ontario

Owner: Metrolinx/GO Transit

Project/Construction Manager: Toronto Transit

Commission (project manager); Delcan, in a joint venture

with Hatch Mott MacDonald, MMM Group, and McCormick

Rankin Corporation (project management consultants)

 Engineer: AECOM (consulting engineer, preliminary planning/

study, design); Arup (fire vent, Keele and Caledonia station—

design); Hatch Mott MacDonald (tunnel designer)

Contractor: James Elliott Underground;

Kanaiden (tunnel launch site)

 Supplier: Bombardier (LRT vehicle supplier);

Caterpillar Tunnelling, formerly Lovat

(tunnel boring machines); Munro (tunnel liners)

Other: AECOM (Black Creek Environmental Assessment);

Delcan (EA, signalling/train control, communications, traction

power, and tunnel ventilation systems)

 Funding: Public

• Provincial Ministry of Transportation capital allotment to Metrolinx/GO Transit

Status: Tunnelling will commence under Eglinton Avenue in the spring of 2011 with project completion scheduled for 2020.

Description:

In one of largest public transit investments in Canadian history, the Province of Ontario will fund this entire project. Phase 1 of the line will be 20 kilometres of light rail service across the Eglinton Avenue corridor in midtown Toronto, with a 12-kilometre (km) segment to be tunnelled.

from near Black Creek Drive in the west to Brentcliffe Road in the east. Metrolinx purchased four tunnel boring machines (TBMs) for the job, but may need another two to four, as the project has increased in scope—an additional 10 km will need to be tunnelled as the LRT transitions.

from an above-ground to an underground project. ReNew Canada met with chief project manager, the Toronto Transit Commission’s (TTC’s) Peter Allibone, and Jack Collins, VP of rapid transit implementation for Metrolinx, at the corner of Black Creek and Eglinton.

Contractors are already on site, working on the tunnel’s first launch shaft. “This site is just a means to an end,” said Allibone, “a hole in the ground to launch the TBMs.” It’s the first of many launch sites to be chosen before the project’s projected completion in 2020. Plans are also underway for the stations that need to be built along the new line. Each one will cost about $80 million (more for the interchange stations). Collins said these will be the most challenging part of this multi-billion-dollar project. Utilities will need to be relocated, local businesses will need to be managed and possibly compensated for road closures, property must be appraised and acquired.