Grand River Transit

[ijmorlan]

the temp road has bus landings on it which to me seems as though they want the buses to use it ASAP due to the impending start of ION and the related GRT changes.

Edit: 15 kVA is the equivalent resistive load of about 15 kilowatts max.

Makes sense about temp road … except that as it happens, it is apparently not being built in the near future. So if the rest of the construction were to happen, it should still be OK for the temp road not to be built.

Thanks for correction on kVA. I think I read a Google result too quickly, without thinking about whether it made sense or whether I was even reading it correctly. 15MW is a lot of power…

[clasher]

A quick glance through the drawings doesn't seem to show a very involved project. Even if they use reinforced concrete for the entire road the cost still surprises me. Last year the company I worked for replaced a section of a cement kiln that weighed ~600 tonnes, used the biggest crane in Canada and had a few weeks of around-the-clock work for ~6 million. I admit I don't know a lot about bidding and about road construction since I work in a different trade but still...

[boatracer]

As a comparison this project is about to start on Homer Watson which is a resurfacing from Manitou to Conestoga College and the addition of a MUT including a bridge over Schneider Creek for $10.8 million.

https://regionofwaterloo.bidsandtenders....1/#Awarded

In fairness there is a lot of electrical power/lighting/comms and bringing all of those services from Philip street for the project for the bus terminal. It is designed as a satellite terminal, not just concrete bus pads a steel shelter and a sign post.

[boatracer]

Honestly, how can it cost 8 million dollars to pour some concrete and put up some shelters, it's not like this involves major underground works or grading or retaining walls or something.

I don’t know — but right away I see an opportunity to save some money. In the documents, it plans for building a temporary road around the construction area. But I know that is not needed. How do I know? Am I spouting off outside of my area of expertise? Well, yes, but the road in question is currently closed to motor vehicle traffic and has been so since the LRT was under construction. So it is definitely OK for it to stay that way until the transit construction is done. So they should start by just deleting Stage 1 of the construction. Not sure how much this would save however as most of the digging will still be needed.

On another note, I saw some interesting details. For one, the electrical power specified includes a number of 15kVA installations. If I understand correctly, this rating means that each one could use about 15MW of power. The only thing I can think of in a transit station that would use that much electricity would be rapid charging of electric bus batteries. There are also some radiant heaters listed, but they seem to take 20A single-pole feeds.

So together with the shelters, it’s significantly more than just a paving job (road/sidewalk). It would be interesting to know how much they were expecting to have to pay. Is there confirmation that the price is why the bid is cancelled?

And in reading Addendum #2 they actually removed the temporary road and bus stops from the scope. No buses will use the area until the station is complete. Only a pedestrian path was to be constructed around the area.

[ijmorlan]

And in reading Addendum #2 they actually removed the temporary road and bus stops from the scope. No buses will use the area until the station is complete. Only a pedestrian path was to be constructed around the area.

Thanks for noticing that, good to know. I hadn’t actually looked at the addenda at all.

[KevinL]

So here's a puzzler. Per the Ion-launch service plan, the 201 will pass Block Line station in both directions on its new extended routing to Conestoga College: https://www.grt.ca/en/about-grt/resource...01-map.png

So with the new Street View imagery, we can see the bus stops in that area. The southbound 201 will clearly use this one: https://goo.gl/maps/pbni2qXNNE82

But where will the northbound bus stop? On the other side of Block Line there's no shelter or clear platform area: https://goo.gl/maps/ziJ89LFdBjM2

A real head-scratcher.

[dunkalunk]

So here's a puzzler. Per the Ion-launch service plan, the 201 will pass Block Line station in both directions on its new extended routing to Conestoga College: https://www.grt.ca/en/about-grt/resource...01-map.png

So with the new Street View imagery, we can see the bus stops in that area. The southbound 201 will clearly use this one: https://goo.gl/maps/pbni2qXNNE82

But where will the northbound bus stop? On the other side of Block Line there's no shelter or clear platform area: https://goo.gl/maps/ziJ89LFdBjM2

A real head-scratcher.

I'm pretty sure in the project agreement drawings, there was a bus turn around lane at hillmount street. It also think there's a bus shelter beside the ION line going Southbound at Hillmount (although this could just be for the new route 8).

Edit: http://rapidtransit.regionofwaterloo.ca/...nplans.asp part 4 page 10. There's a bus only u-turn lane going northbound on Courtland at Hillmount. Not sure if operationally this is still in the plan.

[trainspotter139]

So here's a puzzler. Per the Ion-launch service plan, the 201 will pass Block Line station in both directions on its new extended routing to Conestoga College: https://www.grt.ca/en/about-grt/resource...01-map.png

So with the new Street View imagery, we can see the bus stops in that area. The southbound 201 will clearly use this one: https://goo.gl/maps/pbni2qXNNE82

But where will the northbound bus stop? On the other side of Block Line there's no shelter or clear platform area: https://goo.gl/maps/ziJ89LFdBjM2

A real head-scratcher.

I'm pretty sure in the project agreement drawings, there was a bus turn around lane at hillmount street. It also think there's a bus shelter beside the ION line going Southbound at Hillmount (although this could just be for the new route 8).

There's also this:

   

[KevinL]

Ah, that's what I needed to see! 

Doesn't explain why no stop platform has been built, but it's clear where it's supposed to go

[nms]

What's the typical ratio of "bid takers" vs "tenderers" in a case like this? It would appear that five companies took the bid documents for the UW station, but only two submitted bids. The Region also rejected going ahead with the King-Victoria development. Was there a similarly small pool of groups that bid on Ion? (I seem to recall there were three... how many others showed interest?).

[boatracer]

What's the typical ratio of "bid takers" vs "tenderers" in a case like this? It would appear that five companies took the bid documents for the UW station, but only two submitted bids. The Region also rejected going ahead with the King-Victoria development. Was there a similarly small pool of groups that bid on Ion? (I seem to recall there were three... how many others showed interest?).

There isn't any kind of standard. For this project there was a pre-qualification stage. At that point it looked like about 12 contractors took the package. Only 3 submitted for the PQ. And then only 2 submitted for the bid itself. One of the prequalified bidders didn't take the bid package, the other 3 are construction associations who grab every bid for their members.

On a typical project a number of bid takers could also be subcontractors who register to make sure they get all of the addenda as the GC's may not pass these along quickly enough.

[neonjoe]

Could the number of bid takers be lower because of the fact that the contractors need to be unionized?

[bgb_ca]

I just got an email from GRT for a workshop for some of the beta users of the EasyGo card for future functionality. Unfortunately I can't make it as it is during my work hours (apr 11 530-7)

[KevinL]

I also got the email (and similarly cannot attend). It does sound promising - they're looking at loadable products beyond the parallels to existing media, so I presume this means things like dollar caps on usage (hopefully daily, weekly, and/or monthly), family passes, and other innovations.

[frzn]

Could the number of bid takers be lower because of the fact that the contractors need to be unionized?

Being unionized is not the issue. Almost all local contractors are unionized. It was that it was only "carpenters union" companies could bid on the work.

So for example a local contractor who is affiliated with that union would bid the work then subcontract all the work out to other companies for less money and take in huge profits. The main reason this was fought so hard in the Region was that the union was trying to expand it's reach to all forms of construction (road reconstruction).