Comment 121294

By Haveacow (registered) | Posted April 20, 2017 at 10:15:56

@John 1242 Waterloo has a big advantage in terms of construction costs because a significant percentage of their right of way was built on an existing railway right of way which is a big cost saver and they needed a lot less high cost infrastructure, like massive bridge structures.

Ottawa's 8km long O-Train Line using diesel multiple units (now the Trillium Line), cost only $21 million to construct between 1999-2001 because it used an existing single track railway right of way (with passing tracks at key stations), originally owned by the CPR. The extension of that line to Ottawa's Sir John A Macdonald International Airport (part of the $3.6 Billion Stage 2 Program), which has no pre existing railway right of way is going to cost over 150 Million for 2.2 km of track, signaling and 2 stations. That is without overhead catenary wire and electrical power systems.

Waterloo also doesn't have to build a massive bridge over a 400 series highway either, which will cost anywhere between $70-110 Million to build. The Ion LRT line had to move and rebuild a lot of underground infrastructure unfortunately, you guys have even more underground infrastructure to rebuild and move. Hence a lot of the higher costs.

Waterloo like Hamilton did have to build an expensive railway underpass as well but a lot of that cost was written off from the books because it can be leveraged as the city's portion of the planned GO/VIA Rail & ION interchange station development complex. Where Hamilton's is a free standing structure not part of integrated multi-modal development project.

However, remember they put in $250+ million of their own cash for the capital budget of their Ion LRT project, you guys are not putting any money into the capital budget of this project.

Permalink | Context

Events Calendar

There are no upcoming events right now.
Why not post one?

Recent Articles

Article Archives

Blog Archives

Site Tools

Feeds