ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[tomh009]

Final expropriations/easements along Courtland near Siebert and Shelley are listed in the package as well.

I don't think the 8 months of testing has been mentioned publically before, but I always assumed it would be at least that based on other similar sized systems. The fact that much of it has to happen after the 14th vehicle is delivered was surprising as well.

Yeah, I'm really not clear on why we need eight months after the last vehicle -- I would think at that point we'd just need to test/certify the last vehicle, which should not take anywhere near that long.

Under the original agreement, Bombardier planned to have all vehicles delivered here by December 2016. That was then moved to the following December, pushing the service start to late spring 2018.

And that's only six months, not eight.

[embe]

Could it be that Peter Shawn Taylor was aware of this news before writing the article referenced on pg. 768? The opening comments "...the future appears to look like a bunch of empty tracks designed to make driving more awkward and confusing. Assuming our missing trains do eventually arrive, however...", may not seem as negative, compared to realistic if this schedule was "in the know" for certain people.

**Sorry all, I edited my own post after re-reading and seeing the context it could be taken in**

[tomh009]

Incidentally, Canard, did you see pages 46-55? Something's up with the Courtland/Siebert area but I can't penetrate the legalese.

This is really, really late. Surely we would not be able to start service without this being completed, either. Or would we?

[KevinL]

Where did you see that Kevin?

...I was inferring based on your statement. Did I misunderstand?

Here's a GRT-related question: if the new Fairway and UW terminals are finished by, say, September, will buses serve those even before Ion launch?

[trainspotter139]

Where did you see that Kevin?

...I was inferring based on your statement. Did I misunderstand?

Here's a GRT-related question: if the new Fairway and UW terminals are finished by, say, September, will buses serve those even before Ion launch?

Yes for Fairway. Unlikely for UW

[Bob_McBob]

I have to stay off social media for a couple days, the level of gloating about this is truly revolting.

[danbrotherston]

I have to stay off social media for a couple days, the level of gloating about this is truly revolting.

Indeed!  I cannot stand people who revel in things going badly for the city.

Even when projects I disagree with go badly, I'm not usually happy about it, even if I perhaps use it as an argument to change direction.

[Canard]

Where did you see that Kevin?

...I was inferring based on your statement. Did I misunderstand?

Yes. I don't speak legaleeze! I read 3 words and got confused. I thought you were making a statement saying exactly what happened.

So, who knows what happened and can translate this?

Indeed!  I cannot stand people who revel in things going badly for the city.

Yeah, I've never understood that mentality, at all. People like that make me sick.

[ijmorlan]

Ugh. I am very disappointed in how slowly things have been allowed to proceed and the dearth of testing seen so far, and it seems now that's well founded. Hopefully this lights a fire under the right people and we find a way to shrink these timelines.

Curious: "The original project schedule included 8 months of testing and commissioning activities following the delivery of the last vehicle." Was this always public knowledge?

The vehicles were originally planned to be delivered in lots of time. Given that, it would be reasonable to make a plan that isn’t dependent on the exact date of vehicle arrival, meaning that the time between all the vehicles arriving and the system opening could be quite long. In a different situation, one can imagine even longer — imagine we got a good deal on used vehicles. Maybe they would have arrived in 2014 because that is when they were available. It doesn’t mean all that time is needed for testing.

It is not believable that 8 months, or even 6 months, are truly needed after delivery of the last vehicle to prepare the system for opening. What they should be doing now is moving ahead full speed with everything that can be done with the vehicles now here. Treat the remaining vehicles as additions to a functional system. Let’s get real: say the system is a huge success, so much so that we need to increase service to a level that requires more vehicles. Will it really take 8 months after arrival of the additional vehicles before they can be used in service? I think not. And if it is needed, then there is a severe problem with how these projects are being conducted, because it just shouldn’t take that long. It would be like the bridge engineers coming back and saying that the Laurel Creek rail bridge replacement was going to be a 2-year project.

This project has suffered for many years from a lack of urgency, but this is the most egregious example of it I think we’ve seen.

[Pheidippides]

I don't speak legal-ese either, but my reading of it is that (there is additional background in this report):
-the region authorized temporary easements to allow construction to proceed in 2016 while they continued negotiations with the owner(s)
-those temporary easements expire 31-Dec-2018
-the region and the owners couldn't reach a settlement outside of the expropriation process
-so the region started the expropriation process in October of 2017
-the owners exercised their rights under the expropriation process to a hearing of necessity in November 2017
-that hearing was scheduled for April 2018
-the owners since withdrew their request for a hearing
-the region resumed the expropriation process

The "...possession of the required lands and interests in late Summer of 2018 so that the works to install vehicular and pedestrian access control gates and associated works, and completion of grading, landscaping and restoration, can all be completed before the end of Fall, 2018 which will facilitate the overall project time line."

[KevinL]

So, a lot of back-and-forth over this, then. I guess that's bound to happen somewhere.

[ijmorlan]

...I was inferring based on your statement. Did I misunderstand?

Yes.  I don't speak legaleeze!  I read 3 words and got confused.    I thought you were making a statement saying exactly what happened.

So, who knows what happened and can translate this?

No special knowledge here, but I’ve read my share of legal documents and I’ll try to unpack it a little. Overall, it’s a staff recommendation, which Council can vote on. If they vote to follow the recommendation, then staff will do what they recommended. Of course, Council could pass no motion, in which case nothing happens, or they could pass a different motion (e.g. “come up with more options”, “Look into buying the whole property”, etc.).

The recommendation is to expropriate some property. The rest consists of details and standard boilerplate:

1) detailed description of what is to be expropriated, starting with the heading “Permanent Easement” on Page 46;

2) boilerplate starting with “And that staff be instructed to register a Plan of Expropriation for the property…” on Page 48;

3) background information starting with “Summary” on Page 49;

4) maps on Pages 52-54 with areas labelled in correspondence with the detailed description of the property;

5) list of affected owners on Page 55.

So it’s not actually very complicated, there are just a lot of details that are written out in full every time. In this case, since they appear to be expropriating an easement (right to use the property) of a portion of the property rather than full ownership of the entire property, it’s actually longer and more complicated. If they recommend expropriation of an entire property, the detailed description says something more like “all right and title in …” and then specifies the exact property by street address and legal description. Here, it describes the property and gives an extensive description of what the easement is for, which is so long that one loses the thread of the sentence before reaching the end. And then this is done 3 times, because they have separate easements for grading, construction, and permanent operation. Note on the maps that one of the construction easements sort of wraps around the permanent easement, which makes sense: typically the area occupied by construction activities is larger than the area occupied by the finished project.

Overall, my assessment is that they are expropriating an easement allowing them to install and operate crossing gates on Scherer’s property, and complete the related grading and construction activities.

I hope this is helpful. I would love to have an actual lawyer’s assessment of the accuracy of the above. I am not a lawyer and certainly not your lawyer so take it all with a grain of salt.

[Pheidippides]

Thinking about the new proposed schedule, December 2018 seems unattainable.

Even if they ship one every two weeks, which they haven't done yet, the 14th vehicle would arrive in mid-August. Adding 6 months puts it at February 2019.

Even if they ship one every per week the 14th vehicle would arrive in late-June. Adding 6 months puts it at late December 2018; and that is if everything goes absolutely perfectly, which is highly unlikely given.

Do we know if 501 will be the last to be (re) delivered? It will be unfortunate if that is the hold up when it sat here for nearly a year.

[jeffster]

Ridiculous.

It is indeed. Even though I am a huge fan of the ION, I am not surprised that it's going to be this late, and frankly, I'll be surprised if they start it this December, I'm still thinking spring 2019 at the earliest and summer 2020 at the latest.

[Canard]

For all those “I told you so” types - just what is your pessimistic foreshadowing based on?

Exactly how many other rapid transit projects have you this intensely followed the construction on around the world that qualify you to make that claim?