ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[Markster]

To no one's surprise, the railway bridge at Waterloo Park is already attracting art:

   
   
   

The sooner they commission something to cover up the concrete the better!

[Canard]

As a fan of brutalism, the last thing I'd want to see is that beautiful exposed concrete covered up!

(...and, it does surprise me, because I think of the fine folks of Waterloo Region as generally well above this sort of thing, so yeah, I'm surprised.)

[Pheidippides]

Didn't waste any time at the Allen curve:
   
   

Median poured near John:
   

Retaining wall being built near Union:
   

[Pheidippides]

North side of King underpass excavation:
   
   
   

Can really see the elevation difference between the old and new tracks now:
   

[Markster]

As a fan of brutalism, the last thing I'd want to see is that beautiful exposed concrete covered up!

(...and, it does surprise me, because I think of the fine folks of Waterloo Region as generally well above this sort of thing, so yeah, I'm surprised.)

Brutalism?  Fuck yeah!

However, the finishing on this bridge is very sloppy. Very rough and mismatched.  I don't really see much to lose by painting it with some art.

[Pheidippides]

Charles and Victoria:
   

King and Francis:
   

Not sure what these scoring/cut-outs are for, I saw a few of them on my walk today:
   

Duke:
   
   

[Pheidippides]

Duke:
   

Frederick:
   
   
   

Queen station:
   

[rangersfan]

Thanks as always everyone for all of your time to document and take pictures of this monumental project.

[GtwoK]

That retaining wall / sidewalk at King and Union interests the hell out of me! I remember seeing giant stones lined along there a month ago. I wonder what the framing is for?

[Pheidippides]

I think the large stones were just temporary over the winter to keep the ground and existing sidewalk from collapsing. There is probably a more permanent wall and new sidewalk going in.

[Canard]

The rectangular cutouts in the concrete are for redundant inductive loops for traffic control only.

No progress at Cameron Heights or KCI crossovers.

Railway crossing signals are in at Waterloo Park on the "south" crossing.

UoW platform is getting the same concrete rework for stay current grounding that R&T park got a few weeks ago. 3 more platforms to go after these two.

Bearanger TPSS enclosure is finished off - wood on back, dense vertical black bars on front. Columbia had the poles in place; Northfield TPSS is just about finished off. Not sure how I feel about them.

The crossing behind Albert McCormic Arena has arms now and the guys are wiring/testing them this morning.

Tons of work at the OMSF! Must be 50 guys out in the yard, at least.

Ballasted track is now in place in both directions across the Northfield bridge over the Conestoga Parkway.

Embedded track curve at Northfield/King is complete! Northfield traffic has now shifted to the south side of the Rapidway.

[jamincan]

UoW platform is getting the same concrete rework for stay current grounding that R&T park got a few weeks ago. 3 more platforms to go after these two.

What is this about exactly? I have no idea what "stay current grounding" means, unfortunately.

[Canard]

Oops - "stray". The Project Agreement says that the rebar in the platforms has to be welded (at least one of the bars that runs the full length must be welded to every "width" rebar). They missed this on the first 5 platforms they poured so have to jackhammer them up pretty good. Oops!

[jamincan]

Aha, makes sense. Hopefully they either got it right the first time or caught it the second time at Caroline - it would be slightly ironic if they had to repair it a second time!

[Canard]

1/6 - Saturday, August 27, 2016

Despite a minor neck injury that has left me relatively grounded for most of the week, I decided I couldn't wait any longer to get out, and ended up riding my bike more than 30 km today along the line to see where things are at.

The first batch of photos here are all along Duke Street, in Kitchener, where things are really coming along.