Published in BC Y-Dig 2013:
Kamloops Augering & Boring Ltd. (KAB) is ready for the really big jobs with the world’s largest auger boring machine.
The American Augers 84/96-1800 is capable of boring 96-inch-diameter holes at 1.8-million-pound thrust. Weighing about 30 tonnes, it’s 17 feet long, nine feet wide and more than nine feet tall.
The standard model has a 300-horsepower Caterpillar diesel engine and a Quik Tran system, exclusively from American Augers, that allows for fast return with up to 10,000 pounds of push/pull at high speed. Quik Tran “makes for easier machine operation in challenging work climates or conditions,” according to the manufacturer.
The 84/96, like other American Augers machines, also has a Quik Split frame design that allows separation of the rig into sections for easier placement and removal at work areas.
KAB president Malcolm Bachand told Underground Construction magazine the 84/96 was purchased “to install culverts on a large railroad project.” He was referring to repairs made in the summer of 2011 after an extreme rainfall event in the Peace River area, where KAB installed a new 72-inch-wide and 220-foot-long culvert at the Canadian National Railway’s Chetwynd yard. (An article about the Chetwynd project appeared in last year’s Y-Dig.)
“There is no comparison when it comes to the magnitude of its power when compared to the remainder of our fleet,” KAB’s Harry Dickinson said of the big machine this past March. However, he added, loading and unloading can be difficult due to its gargantuan size.
Dickinson said KAB does benefit by having the 84/96. “Installing and cleaning larger-diameter pipe has become easier. Typically, we would have to use a smaller ABM and significantly smaller auger to clean anything over 72 inches.
“The biggest benefit will be using our larger hammers with our 84/96 machine for installing up to 120-inch-diameter casings.
Established in 1976, Kamloops Augering & Boring provides comprehensive services in trenchless construction. Its services and expertise include tunneling, large-diameter pipe ramming, auger boring, rock boring, pilot tube microtunneling and horizontal pile driving.
American Augers manufactures auger boring machines, drilling rigs and related products at a 141,000-square-foot facility in West Salem, Ohio. The company proclaims on its website that its core value is “having products developed by a can-do workforce that focuses on mechanical, technological and customer-based design improvements.”
Showing posts with label construction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label construction. Show all posts
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Hot & Cold Success
Published in Manitoba Business Magazine, May/June 2009:
Ice Kube Systems takes heat from below ground level and puts it to work above-ground at indoor winter sports centres. And it’s been scoring in markets across the continent and overseas.
The West St. Paul manufacturer’s geothermal heat-pump systems are used at hockey and curling rinks across Canada, from 100 Mile House in B.C. to Springhill in Nova Scotia.
Ice Kube has infiltrated the U.S. market, too, notes Steve Sacher, the firm’s vice-president of international development and operations.
The company’s surprisingly compact heat pump units, used for cooling and heating in a variety of building types, are operating at more than 60 locations in North America. Sacher says about two-fifths of those places are in the United States.
Not that Ice Kube is limiting itself to the North American market. To the contrary, it is wooing customers as far away as the United Arab Emirates.
The government of Dubai, the Persian Gulf country’s wealthiest and most populous jurisdiction, is trying to build a “zero carbon footprint” community. Ice Kube’s “green” technology seems to be a good fit with that objective.
“Our role in that project – if there is one - is not defined yet, but we continue to talk with (the developers) and we’re optimistic,” Sacher says.
And then there are the potential new customers Ice Kube is courting in Scotland and Ireland, where curling rinks face soaring energy costs.
Schools in England are considering Ice Kube’s geothermal technology to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, he adds.
Closer to home, the Ice Kube team has secured a deal with a New Brunswick town to install a geothermal system at a $21-million recreation complex.
The Q-Plex in Quispamsis, N.B., will be the first recreation facility in North America to win Gold-level LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification. Sacher says Ice Kube’s geothermal technology, utilizing a renewable resource and producing essentially no carbon emissions, is a perfect fit for such aspirations.
Ice Kube geothermal heat pumps can also be found in Russia and South Korea.
Sacher says projects in which Ice Kube has been involved come in a broad range of sizes, from an indoor rink at a rural Canadian Prairies household to an art collector’s private estate near San Francisco.
The guts of Ice Kube Systems’ product are housed in metal cubes that are just a few feet tall. Heat is sucked up from underground loops of pipes and converted to hotter or colder temperatures to suit a facility’s needs.
“Technically, what makes it unique is that we simultaneously heat and cool,” says Sacher. “We have the ability to produce both chilled and hot fluid simultaneously.”
And the equipment can deliver a high range of temperatures, cooling to 10 F or heating to 145 F.
Every component in the Kubes, which are assembled below Sacher’s second-floor office in West St. Paul, is “off the shelf” rather than specially made, he notes.
“What that means is that, from a maintenance perspective, you don’t need highly specialized mechanics. From an ease-of-maintenance perspective, it’s a huge advantage.”
Ease of maintenance is an especially important consideration in places far from major urban centres. Facility operators appreciate knowing that their regular maintenance personnel can, with just a bit of training, keep the Ice Kubes running.
“What really makes us unique and successful, though, is our approach to the marketplace,” says Sacher.
The company has developed close “strategic partnerships” with its distributors so that they’re like “an extension of the company,” he explains.
That corporate philosophy applies to Ice Kube staff, a small group sharing a building with its parent company on St. Paul Boulevard, he says. “We all have to feel like owners and we all make decisions as owners.”
Also, he says, Ice Kube Systems strives to remain “boutique-y” even while sales are growing at an impressive pace.
He says net revenue grew by about 60 per cent in 2008 versus 2007, and is projected to grow by more than 30 per cent this year compared to last.
But he adds the company is “being careful not to grow too quickly.”
Not being a “mass producer” means Ice Kube can always keep an eye on quality and creativity, he says.
The company’s systems are more expensive to install than more conventional systems but they’re so efficient that the extra installation cost is typically recovered within three to five years, he adds.
The story of Ice Kube Systems dates back to about 15 years ago, when Selkirk came to Frontier Refrigeration and Mechanical Services with a challenge.
The municipality was using geothermal technology at its hockey rink, but not using it very well.
“The product that they were using was not specifically designed for hockey rinks,” recalls Walter Lehmann, Frontier founder and president. “It was just not the right product for that particular application.”
“What we decided at that point was that the concept was good but we had to design new equipment specifically for that application.”
Lehmann says the experience gave Frontier “an opportunity to create a product for that market.”
The product in turn was the foundation for a new division of Frontier.
“It’s a relatively simple storyline, but exciting because it’s the start of how we got to where we are now,” says Lehmann.
The first Ice Kube units were sold mainly in smaller, rural communities in Manitoba, he says.
The product line’s first international sale was made in the late 1990s when six of the heat-pump systems were purchased by a Minnesota electric utility.
Ice Kube Systems Ltd. was spun off as a separate company a few years later. Lehmann is president of both companies. Sacher came on board two years ago.
The West St. Paul manufacturer’s geothermal heat-pump systems are used at hockey and curling rinks across Canada, from 100 Mile House in B.C. to Springhill in Nova Scotia.
Ice Kube has infiltrated the U.S. market, too, notes Steve Sacher, the firm’s vice-president of international development and operations.
The company’s surprisingly compact heat pump units, used for cooling and heating in a variety of building types, are operating at more than 60 locations in North America. Sacher says about two-fifths of those places are in the United States.
Not that Ice Kube is limiting itself to the North American market. To the contrary, it is wooing customers as far away as the United Arab Emirates.
The government of Dubai, the Persian Gulf country’s wealthiest and most populous jurisdiction, is trying to build a “zero carbon footprint” community. Ice Kube’s “green” technology seems to be a good fit with that objective.
“Our role in that project – if there is one - is not defined yet, but we continue to talk with (the developers) and we’re optimistic,” Sacher says.
And then there are the potential new customers Ice Kube is courting in Scotland and Ireland, where curling rinks face soaring energy costs.
Schools in England are considering Ice Kube’s geothermal technology to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, he adds.
Closer to home, the Ice Kube team has secured a deal with a New Brunswick town to install a geothermal system at a $21-million recreation complex.
The Q-Plex in Quispamsis, N.B., will be the first recreation facility in North America to win Gold-level LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification. Sacher says Ice Kube’s geothermal technology, utilizing a renewable resource and producing essentially no carbon emissions, is a perfect fit for such aspirations.
Ice Kube geothermal heat pumps can also be found in Russia and South Korea.
Sacher says projects in which Ice Kube has been involved come in a broad range of sizes, from an indoor rink at a rural Canadian Prairies household to an art collector’s private estate near San Francisco.
The guts of Ice Kube Systems’ product are housed in metal cubes that are just a few feet tall. Heat is sucked up from underground loops of pipes and converted to hotter or colder temperatures to suit a facility’s needs.
“Technically, what makes it unique is that we simultaneously heat and cool,” says Sacher. “We have the ability to produce both chilled and hot fluid simultaneously.”
And the equipment can deliver a high range of temperatures, cooling to 10 F or heating to 145 F.
Every component in the Kubes, which are assembled below Sacher’s second-floor office in West St. Paul, is “off the shelf” rather than specially made, he notes.
“What that means is that, from a maintenance perspective, you don’t need highly specialized mechanics. From an ease-of-maintenance perspective, it’s a huge advantage.”
Ease of maintenance is an especially important consideration in places far from major urban centres. Facility operators appreciate knowing that their regular maintenance personnel can, with just a bit of training, keep the Ice Kubes running.
“What really makes us unique and successful, though, is our approach to the marketplace,” says Sacher.
The company has developed close “strategic partnerships” with its distributors so that they’re like “an extension of the company,” he explains.
That corporate philosophy applies to Ice Kube staff, a small group sharing a building with its parent company on St. Paul Boulevard, he says. “We all have to feel like owners and we all make decisions as owners.”
Also, he says, Ice Kube Systems strives to remain “boutique-y” even while sales are growing at an impressive pace.
He says net revenue grew by about 60 per cent in 2008 versus 2007, and is projected to grow by more than 30 per cent this year compared to last.
But he adds the company is “being careful not to grow too quickly.”
Not being a “mass producer” means Ice Kube can always keep an eye on quality and creativity, he says.
The company’s systems are more expensive to install than more conventional systems but they’re so efficient that the extra installation cost is typically recovered within three to five years, he adds.
The story of Ice Kube Systems dates back to about 15 years ago, when Selkirk came to Frontier Refrigeration and Mechanical Services with a challenge.
The municipality was using geothermal technology at its hockey rink, but not using it very well.
“The product that they were using was not specifically designed for hockey rinks,” recalls Walter Lehmann, Frontier founder and president. “It was just not the right product for that particular application.”
“What we decided at that point was that the concept was good but we had to design new equipment specifically for that application.”
Lehmann says the experience gave Frontier “an opportunity to create a product for that market.”
The product in turn was the foundation for a new division of Frontier.
“It’s a relatively simple storyline, but exciting because it’s the start of how we got to where we are now,” says Lehmann.
The first Ice Kube units were sold mainly in smaller, rural communities in Manitoba, he says.
The product line’s first international sale was made in the late 1990s when six of the heat-pump systems were purchased by a Minnesota electric utility.
Ice Kube Systems Ltd. was spun off as a separate company a few years later. Lehmann is president of both companies. Sacher came on board two years ago.
Onward and Upward
Published in Piling Industry Canada Magazine 2009:
The 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week airport at the end of Wellington Avenue in northwest Winnipeg remains bustling even as it undergoes the most momentous transition in its history.
A new four-level parkade is up and providing vehicle accommodation north of the 45-year-old terminal building while, just north of the parkade, there’s a hum of activity as construction of the old terminal’s replacement continues. Elsewhere, a bus depot is under construction, as is a utilities building. And a sign at the airport property’s outskirts proclaims the future home of a mail-sorting facility, itself under construction.
As cars, vans and trucks pass by on the way to dropping off and picking up airline passengers, workers are in the process of turning about 4,500 tonnes of steel, more than 12,000 cubic metres of concrete and sundry other ingredients into a shiny new landmark for the gateway to Canada’s West.
Winnipeg’s international airport is being transformed – modernized and augmented, if you will – with a gleaming new terminal building that will be about one-third bigger than what it replaces.
The existing terminal was built in 1962-64 after continuous post-war growth in air travel. At the time, approximately 600,000 passengers used the airport annually. Ever-increasing passenger traffic prompted the terminal’s expansion in 1984. Passenger volumes have followed an upward trend in the 25 years since, with a notable dip following the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. Passenger traffic was down in the first quarter of 2009, too – probably a blip due to the global recession.
The need for a bigger airport was obvious before the 20th century made its final bow, and became more pressing as the millennium grew older. In 2008, for example, the airport hosted 3.5 million passengers, a 28 per cent increase from 2000 and 50 per cent more than in 1995. Cargo loads rose 44 per cent from 2000 to 2008, to 150,000 tonnes.
Renamed James Armstrong Richardson International Airport in December 2006, the facility is Canada’s seventh-busiest airport.
Passenger volume is projected to reach 4.1 million by 2015 and 4.6 million by 2020. Cargo tonnage is expected to increase as well, and there are about a million visits annually by people accompanying passengers to the airport or meeting passengers post-flight. All of these statistics from the Winnipeg Airports Authority (WAA) point to a need for more and bigger facilities.
Accommodation by design
The WAA contracted Pelli Clarke Pelli and Associates as “master architect” to design the new 51,000-square-metre terminal in collaboration with Stantec Architecture (the building’s “prime architect”).
That’s Pelli as in Cesar Pelli, an Argentina-born but New York-based architect who has made his mark on urban skylines with such notable landmarks as the Wells Fargo Centre skyscraper in Minneapolis, the Wachovia Center office tower in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and the 452-metre Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The Petronas towers are the world’s tallest twin buildings and were the world’s two tallest buildings for several years until 2004, when they were surpassed by an office tower in Taiwan.
While he’s most famous for skyscrapers, the 82-year-old Pelli also has some notable airport terminals in his portfolio. Terminals B and C at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport were designed by him, as were Terminal 2 of Tokyo’s Haneda airport and the TWA terminal building at New York’s Kennedy airport.
Pelli visited the Winnipeg airport and surveyed the area to get a feel for the project before getting to work on designing the new building, says WAA spokesperson Christine Alongi, adding that the new building “has been conceived as a signature building connecting (Winnipeg) with the rest of the world.”
Besides being bigger to meet the needs of an increasingly busy airport, the emerging new terminal is also touted to improve “customer wayfinding” (i.e., people’s ability to get around within its space and find the things they seek), the range of concession services (restaurants and stores), and customs processing for international travellers. It’s also designed for universal accessibility, so that passengers with disabilities can access services with ease.
The building is designed to meet the criteria for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification from the Canadian Green Building Council. Extensive use of natural light will cut electricity consumption by reducing the need for artificial lighting. At the same time, windows will cut cooling costs in the warmer months by reflecting excess sunlight away.
Another important component of the terminal’s “green” design is its waste-heat recovery system. Waste heat in the central utilities building’s boiler operations will be captured, as will heat from the main computer and server rooms, for reuse in the hot-water system for heating the new terminal building.
That’s pretty impressive, but there’s more. “An advanced electrical demand management system will sense and turn on what’s needed, then sense and turn off what’s not needed—for example, by turning off each baggage carousel when all luggage has been removed, rather than staying in motion until someone notices that equipment is being used for no purpose and manually shutting down machinery,” says Alongi.
Everybody benefits from the terminal’s LEED-worthy design, says WAA project manager Lloyd McGinnis.
“From an energy point of view, this is a very efficient facility,” he says. “Though it’s a much larger facility than the existing terminal, the projections are that in fact it will use less energy than the existing terminal. Everybody benefits from that, because that means less charges to the air companies, and if there’s less charges to them, ticket prices can be lower and so on.
“From the environmental point of view, we’re learning every day that the more environmentally conscious we are, the more efficient we are.”
A big job like the new terminal building, with all those tonnes of steel and concrete, demands a thorough and careful approach to foundation work. “The approach to piling was based on proven professional methods with a significant degree of planning in advance to make the process smooth, predictable and productive,” Alongi remarks.
Subterranean (Manitoba) Ltd., a company based in West St. Paul, Manitoba, that’s been in the foundation business for about 60 years, was hired as the project’s foundation subcontractor. Subterranean’s recent work includes the new water treatment plant being built east of Winnipeg, the recently completed Manitoba Hydro building in the city’s downtown, and the MTS Centre hockey arena. It has also landed the foundation contract for the future Canadian Museum for Human Rights.
Hundreds of precast and cast-in-place piles and caissons were used. The precast driven piles are approximately eight inches wide and 30-plus feet deep. The depth of drilled, cast-in-place caissons varies depending on depth of bearing strata, with size ranging from three to 14 feet in diameter.
All piles are custom designed to support specific loads, following a design made in accordance with current national building codes. Piles are driven until a specified resistance is met. Caissons were founded on a very dense till layer with a high bearing capacity. Both straight-shaft and belled caissons were used. Till/hardpan was relatively consistent at a depth of approximately 30 feet.
On track for 2010
On a cool spring day, the labours of building a new terminal continue as car and truck traffic provides an ambient soundtrack to the changes underway. The project, managed by Winnipeg-based Wardrop Engineering and California-headquartered Parsons Corporation, is on track for completion in 2010.
“I think it has gone well under the circumstances of the contractors having been plagued by labour shortages along the way, and then we have not had the kindest weather in the last two winters,” the WAA’s McGinnis remarks as the work proceeds.
“They’ve had some setbacks because of weather but even in spite of the very severe winter that we’ve had this year, a tremendous amount of work took place around and within the air terminal.
“The biggest challenge for everybody in this area over the last two and a half years has been labour shortages,” he adds. “Everybody went to Alberta and B.C. … But at the moment we have about 420 people working on the air terminal itself almost every day. That has picked up from, say, 300 last summer.”
Official groundbreaking for the redevelopment program took place September 15, 2005, with Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz and Manitoba Transportation Minister Ron Lemieux among the dignitaries on hand.
A four-level, 1,600-stall parkade (also home to car-rental outlets) was constructed in 2006 by PCL Constructors, doubling the number of parking spaces at the airport. A pedestrian bridge between the parkade and the terminal is to be completed this year.
South of the parkade, on Powerhouse Road, the airport’s new central utilities building (CUB) nears completion. McGinnis says the CUB was “about 90 per complete” by early May and expects it to be finished before the leaves change colour this year.
Redevelopment’s other main components, aside from the terminal building, parkade and CUB, are what McGinnis refers to as “airside” (runways, aprons, etc., for the airlines) and “groundside” (roadways, walkways and the like). He says the former was 90 per cent done as of early May, and the latter will be mostly completed by autumn.
Total cost of the entire redevelopment program – terminal building, parkade, roadways and all – has been pegged at $585 million. The terminal building itself will cost about $270 million. The budget has remained essentially unchanged despite pressures in the labour and materials markets. And it’s all funded through an Airport Improvement Fee applied to every passenger boarding a flight at the airport.
One of the most significant challenges has been building in the middle of a busy, 24-hour-a-day airport, says Alongi. “A prime focus has been maintaining current airport terminal and parking activities with minimal disruption to passengers or other customers. As a result, it has been necessary to isolate construction to the maximum degree possible away from the public.”
Contractors in the airport redevelopment program’s various components include Man-Shield Construction, PCL Constructors Canada, Nelson River Construction, Mulder Construction, McCaine Electric and Otis Elevators.
General contractor for the terminal building is EllisDon Corporation, which was awarded the contract in 2007 after a competitive bidding process in which a variety of criteria was applied to determine the bidder offering the best value. EllisDon selected Subterranean for the foundation work.
The 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week airport at the end of Wellington Avenue in northwest Winnipeg remains bustling even as it undergoes the most momentous transition in its history.
A new four-level parkade is up and providing vehicle accommodation north of the 45-year-old terminal building while, just north of the parkade, there’s a hum of activity as construction of the old terminal’s replacement continues. Elsewhere, a bus depot is under construction, as is a utilities building. And a sign at the airport property’s outskirts proclaims the future home of a mail-sorting facility, itself under construction.
As cars, vans and trucks pass by on the way to dropping off and picking up airline passengers, workers are in the process of turning about 4,500 tonnes of steel, more than 12,000 cubic metres of concrete and sundry other ingredients into a shiny new landmark for the gateway to Canada’s West.
Winnipeg’s international airport is being transformed – modernized and augmented, if you will – with a gleaming new terminal building that will be about one-third bigger than what it replaces.
The existing terminal was built in 1962-64 after continuous post-war growth in air travel. At the time, approximately 600,000 passengers used the airport annually. Ever-increasing passenger traffic prompted the terminal’s expansion in 1984. Passenger volumes have followed an upward trend in the 25 years since, with a notable dip following the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. Passenger traffic was down in the first quarter of 2009, too – probably a blip due to the global recession.
The need for a bigger airport was obvious before the 20th century made its final bow, and became more pressing as the millennium grew older. In 2008, for example, the airport hosted 3.5 million passengers, a 28 per cent increase from 2000 and 50 per cent more than in 1995. Cargo loads rose 44 per cent from 2000 to 2008, to 150,000 tonnes.
Renamed James Armstrong Richardson International Airport in December 2006, the facility is Canada’s seventh-busiest airport.
Passenger volume is projected to reach 4.1 million by 2015 and 4.6 million by 2020. Cargo tonnage is expected to increase as well, and there are about a million visits annually by people accompanying passengers to the airport or meeting passengers post-flight. All of these statistics from the Winnipeg Airports Authority (WAA) point to a need for more and bigger facilities.
Accommodation by design
The WAA contracted Pelli Clarke Pelli and Associates as “master architect” to design the new 51,000-square-metre terminal in collaboration with Stantec Architecture (the building’s “prime architect”).
That’s Pelli as in Cesar Pelli, an Argentina-born but New York-based architect who has made his mark on urban skylines with such notable landmarks as the Wells Fargo Centre skyscraper in Minneapolis, the Wachovia Center office tower in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and the 452-metre Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The Petronas towers are the world’s tallest twin buildings and were the world’s two tallest buildings for several years until 2004, when they were surpassed by an office tower in Taiwan.
While he’s most famous for skyscrapers, the 82-year-old Pelli also has some notable airport terminals in his portfolio. Terminals B and C at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport were designed by him, as were Terminal 2 of Tokyo’s Haneda airport and the TWA terminal building at New York’s Kennedy airport.
Pelli visited the Winnipeg airport and surveyed the area to get a feel for the project before getting to work on designing the new building, says WAA spokesperson Christine Alongi, adding that the new building “has been conceived as a signature building connecting (Winnipeg) with the rest of the world.”
Besides being bigger to meet the needs of an increasingly busy airport, the emerging new terminal is also touted to improve “customer wayfinding” (i.e., people’s ability to get around within its space and find the things they seek), the range of concession services (restaurants and stores), and customs processing for international travellers. It’s also designed for universal accessibility, so that passengers with disabilities can access services with ease.
The building is designed to meet the criteria for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification from the Canadian Green Building Council. Extensive use of natural light will cut electricity consumption by reducing the need for artificial lighting. At the same time, windows will cut cooling costs in the warmer months by reflecting excess sunlight away.
Another important component of the terminal’s “green” design is its waste-heat recovery system. Waste heat in the central utilities building’s boiler operations will be captured, as will heat from the main computer and server rooms, for reuse in the hot-water system for heating the new terminal building.
That’s pretty impressive, but there’s more. “An advanced electrical demand management system will sense and turn on what’s needed, then sense and turn off what’s not needed—for example, by turning off each baggage carousel when all luggage has been removed, rather than staying in motion until someone notices that equipment is being used for no purpose and manually shutting down machinery,” says Alongi.
Everybody benefits from the terminal’s LEED-worthy design, says WAA project manager Lloyd McGinnis.
“From an energy point of view, this is a very efficient facility,” he says. “Though it’s a much larger facility than the existing terminal, the projections are that in fact it will use less energy than the existing terminal. Everybody benefits from that, because that means less charges to the air companies, and if there’s less charges to them, ticket prices can be lower and so on.
“From the environmental point of view, we’re learning every day that the more environmentally conscious we are, the more efficient we are.”
A big job like the new terminal building, with all those tonnes of steel and concrete, demands a thorough and careful approach to foundation work. “The approach to piling was based on proven professional methods with a significant degree of planning in advance to make the process smooth, predictable and productive,” Alongi remarks.
Subterranean (Manitoba) Ltd., a company based in West St. Paul, Manitoba, that’s been in the foundation business for about 60 years, was hired as the project’s foundation subcontractor. Subterranean’s recent work includes the new water treatment plant being built east of Winnipeg, the recently completed Manitoba Hydro building in the city’s downtown, and the MTS Centre hockey arena. It has also landed the foundation contract for the future Canadian Museum for Human Rights.
Hundreds of precast and cast-in-place piles and caissons were used. The precast driven piles are approximately eight inches wide and 30-plus feet deep. The depth of drilled, cast-in-place caissons varies depending on depth of bearing strata, with size ranging from three to 14 feet in diameter.
All piles are custom designed to support specific loads, following a design made in accordance with current national building codes. Piles are driven until a specified resistance is met. Caissons were founded on a very dense till layer with a high bearing capacity. Both straight-shaft and belled caissons were used. Till/hardpan was relatively consistent at a depth of approximately 30 feet.
On track for 2010
On a cool spring day, the labours of building a new terminal continue as car and truck traffic provides an ambient soundtrack to the changes underway. The project, managed by Winnipeg-based Wardrop Engineering and California-headquartered Parsons Corporation, is on track for completion in 2010.
“I think it has gone well under the circumstances of the contractors having been plagued by labour shortages along the way, and then we have not had the kindest weather in the last two winters,” the WAA’s McGinnis remarks as the work proceeds.
“They’ve had some setbacks because of weather but even in spite of the very severe winter that we’ve had this year, a tremendous amount of work took place around and within the air terminal.
“The biggest challenge for everybody in this area over the last two and a half years has been labour shortages,” he adds. “Everybody went to Alberta and B.C. … But at the moment we have about 420 people working on the air terminal itself almost every day. That has picked up from, say, 300 last summer.”
Official groundbreaking for the redevelopment program took place September 15, 2005, with Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz and Manitoba Transportation Minister Ron Lemieux among the dignitaries on hand.
A four-level, 1,600-stall parkade (also home to car-rental outlets) was constructed in 2006 by PCL Constructors, doubling the number of parking spaces at the airport. A pedestrian bridge between the parkade and the terminal is to be completed this year.
South of the parkade, on Powerhouse Road, the airport’s new central utilities building (CUB) nears completion. McGinnis says the CUB was “about 90 per complete” by early May and expects it to be finished before the leaves change colour this year.
Redevelopment’s other main components, aside from the terminal building, parkade and CUB, are what McGinnis refers to as “airside” (runways, aprons, etc., for the airlines) and “groundside” (roadways, walkways and the like). He says the former was 90 per cent done as of early May, and the latter will be mostly completed by autumn.
Total cost of the entire redevelopment program – terminal building, parkade, roadways and all – has been pegged at $585 million. The terminal building itself will cost about $270 million. The budget has remained essentially unchanged despite pressures in the labour and materials markets. And it’s all funded through an Airport Improvement Fee applied to every passenger boarding a flight at the airport.
One of the most significant challenges has been building in the middle of a busy, 24-hour-a-day airport, says Alongi. “A prime focus has been maintaining current airport terminal and parking activities with minimal disruption to passengers or other customers. As a result, it has been necessary to isolate construction to the maximum degree possible away from the public.”
Contractors in the airport redevelopment program’s various components include Man-Shield Construction, PCL Constructors Canada, Nelson River Construction, Mulder Construction, McCaine Electric and Otis Elevators.
General contractor for the terminal building is EllisDon Corporation, which was awarded the contract in 2007 after a competitive bidding process in which a variety of criteria was applied to determine the bidder offering the best value. EllisDon selected Subterranean for the foundation work.
On the Trail to a Ring Road
Published in CCA Magazine 2008:
A ring road for burgeoning Calgary was declared a top priority in 2003, when Alberta and Ottawa announced major funding for the project.
"The governments of Canada and Alberta agree that the Calgary and Edmonton ring roads are top infrastructure priorities," then prime minister Jean Chrétien stated in a news release. "With this investment, we will keep people and goods moving quickly and efficiently to, and through, these cities. We will also help clear the air by reducing traffic congestion in the city centres."
A ring road “will reduce congestion, make the movement of goods more efficient” and make travel safer, then premier Ralph Klein added as the two levels of government announced hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for ring roads in Alberta’s two biggest cities.
But just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, the Calgary Ring Road is taking years to become a reality. The northwest segment is set for completion next year while the northeast portion is scheduled for completion by 2009 – six years after the big federal-provincial funding announcement.
The Calgary Ring Road made a big step forward this year with the announcement of a public-private partnership for the northeast portion. The Stoney Trail Group, a consortium of private-sector companies, signed a 30-year contract with Alberta Infrastructure and Transportation to design, build and operate the road from its junction with Deerfoot Trail to 17 Avenue SE. Construction got underway in the summer.
The proposed southwest portion remains problematic. Still in planning and consultation stages, the southwest segment would run partly through Tsuu T’ina First Nation territory. As of early September, the First Nation and the province were still working on a final price for that land. And even if negotiators reach a deal this year, it would still need approval from Ottawa and the people of Tsuu T’ina. That could take another year or so. After that, actual road construction would take another two or three years.
Craig Cheffins, who replaced Klein as MLA for Calgary-Elbow in a byelection this spring, launched a petition in August urging the province to resolve the impasse as quickly as possible.
What a long, strange trip it’s been so far.
What Calgary needs
The Calgary ring road concept dates back at least 40 years. Construction of a transportation utility corridor (TUC) – a route around the city for motor vehicles, pipelines, power lines and municipal utilities – was recommended in a 1967 report to the provincial government.
A potential route for that TUC was identified in 1974; a couple of years later, the province enacted legislation freezing development along the TUC route. The route was modified in subsequent years though much of the east and south portion of ring road remains essentially unchanged, says Garry Lamb of Alberta Infrastructure and Transportation.
Most of the land for Calgary’s ring road had been acquired by 1985 and the first section of the northwest portion was built more than 10 years ago, he added.
Why has the process taken so long?
“I think part of it was that by the mid to late ’70s things had progressed so that there was a good concept in place, but then there was quite a major (economic) downturn in Alberta in the early 1980s,” says Lamb.
“When things recovered in the late ’80s, transportation wasn’t the first priority in everybody’s mind. So allocation of resources to implement the ring road … wasn’t a political priority in the late ’80s and early ’90s. And at that time, Calgary still had a good transportation infrastructure for its needs.
“What happened in the ’90s, though, was that Calgary continued to grow pretty rapidly and the transportation network didn’t. So pressures started to build to start implementing the ring road.
“But then the provincial deficit issue was a political priority, so the government was reducing funding across the board on all programs, and transportation was certainly one of them. So we ended up not spending money on (new roads and some other infrastructure projects).
“Then, come the late 1990s and the turn of the millennium, finances are good in Alberta and there’s a fresh push on to deal with some of the infrastructure deficit. And certainly the ring roads in Calgary and Edmonton are big pieces of that.”
While the northern portions of Calgary’s ring road head toward completion, there’s no work on the southern segments. Lamb seems unworried by that.
The province is “cautiously optimistic” that negotiations with Tsuu T’ina for the southwest land will conclude with a deal this year, he said.
And the southeast portion is a “very straightforward” project on land that the province already owns, he added, so construction there could start “when we have resources and if the southwest leg gets (sidetracked by negotiations) we’ll probably continue on and build the southeast leg of the ring road as soon as we’re wrapping up the northeast leg.”
Northeast partnership
Bilfinger Berger BOT, Flatiron Constructors, Graham Construction, Carmacks Enterprises and EarthTech - collectively the Stoney Trail Group – signed a 30-year contract with the province in February to design, build, operate and partially finance 21 kilometres of four- and six-lane roadway and nearly two dozen bridge structures in northeast Calgary from Deerfoot Trail to 17 Avenue SE.
The project also includes six interchanges – at Deerfoot Trail, Metis Trail, Country Hills Boulevard, Airport Trail, McKnight Boulevard and 16 Avenue NE.
The government will pay the Stoney Trail Group $300 million toward construction of the northeast section and $21 million per year once the road is open to traffic. Premier Ed Stelmach has said the arrangement, worth some $650 million to the Stoney Trail Group, “represents excellent value for taxpayers.”
The contract also includes maintenance of the roadway from Deerfoot Trail to 16 Avenue NW.
Bolfinger, headquartered in Wiesbaden, Germany, is at the centre of the project as developer. This is the company’s “first project in Alberta and represents a very important milestone for our group,” president John McArthur said when the P3 was announced. “We are looking forward to a long-term partnership with the province for the successful implementation of the project.”
Other Bolfinger transportation infrastructure projects include the Herrentunnel under the Trave River at Lubeck, Germany, completed in 2005 after less than four years of construction, and a P3 for development and maintenance of a 26-kilometre stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway that crosses Kicking Horse Pass.
Earth Tech, a unit of giant Tyco International headquartered in California, is the project’s lead designer. Graham, Carmacks and Flatiron comprise Stoney Trail Constructors, the builders in this project.
Calgary-based Graham “brings a local presence, knowledge of the local (construction) industry and its standards and the workforce – all that kind of good stuff,” Graham Infrastructure Ltd. president John Connolly says. “And it brings in particular an expertise in interchange and bridge building, which is a large component of the project.”
Graham is a force behind many Calgary-area interchange and bridge projects of recent years, including the current Glenmore Trail/Elbow Drive/5 Street SW interchange project which has a contract value of about $70 million.
The Stoney Trail Group is endeavouring to keep a lid on the dust and noise problems that are an inevitable part of road construction. Full-time water trucks travel up and down the construction site to reduce dust; all municipal and provincial noise guidelines are followed.
A ring road for burgeoning Calgary was declared a top priority in 2003, when Alberta and Ottawa announced major funding for the project.
"The governments of Canada and Alberta agree that the Calgary and Edmonton ring roads are top infrastructure priorities," then prime minister Jean Chrétien stated in a news release. "With this investment, we will keep people and goods moving quickly and efficiently to, and through, these cities. We will also help clear the air by reducing traffic congestion in the city centres."
A ring road “will reduce congestion, make the movement of goods more efficient” and make travel safer, then premier Ralph Klein added as the two levels of government announced hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for ring roads in Alberta’s two biggest cities.
But just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, the Calgary Ring Road is taking years to become a reality. The northwest segment is set for completion next year while the northeast portion is scheduled for completion by 2009 – six years after the big federal-provincial funding announcement.
The Calgary Ring Road made a big step forward this year with the announcement of a public-private partnership for the northeast portion. The Stoney Trail Group, a consortium of private-sector companies, signed a 30-year contract with Alberta Infrastructure and Transportation to design, build and operate the road from its junction with Deerfoot Trail to 17 Avenue SE. Construction got underway in the summer.
The proposed southwest portion remains problematic. Still in planning and consultation stages, the southwest segment would run partly through Tsuu T’ina First Nation territory. As of early September, the First Nation and the province were still working on a final price for that land. And even if negotiators reach a deal this year, it would still need approval from Ottawa and the people of Tsuu T’ina. That could take another year or so. After that, actual road construction would take another two or three years.
Craig Cheffins, who replaced Klein as MLA for Calgary-Elbow in a byelection this spring, launched a petition in August urging the province to resolve the impasse as quickly as possible.
What a long, strange trip it’s been so far.
What Calgary needs
The Calgary ring road concept dates back at least 40 years. Construction of a transportation utility corridor (TUC) – a route around the city for motor vehicles, pipelines, power lines and municipal utilities – was recommended in a 1967 report to the provincial government.
A potential route for that TUC was identified in 1974; a couple of years later, the province enacted legislation freezing development along the TUC route. The route was modified in subsequent years though much of the east and south portion of ring road remains essentially unchanged, says Garry Lamb of Alberta Infrastructure and Transportation.
Most of the land for Calgary’s ring road had been acquired by 1985 and the first section of the northwest portion was built more than 10 years ago, he added.
Why has the process taken so long?
“I think part of it was that by the mid to late ’70s things had progressed so that there was a good concept in place, but then there was quite a major (economic) downturn in Alberta in the early 1980s,” says Lamb.
“When things recovered in the late ’80s, transportation wasn’t the first priority in everybody’s mind. So allocation of resources to implement the ring road … wasn’t a political priority in the late ’80s and early ’90s. And at that time, Calgary still had a good transportation infrastructure for its needs.
“What happened in the ’90s, though, was that Calgary continued to grow pretty rapidly and the transportation network didn’t. So pressures started to build to start implementing the ring road.
“But then the provincial deficit issue was a political priority, so the government was reducing funding across the board on all programs, and transportation was certainly one of them. So we ended up not spending money on (new roads and some other infrastructure projects).
“Then, come the late 1990s and the turn of the millennium, finances are good in Alberta and there’s a fresh push on to deal with some of the infrastructure deficit. And certainly the ring roads in Calgary and Edmonton are big pieces of that.”
While the northern portions of Calgary’s ring road head toward completion, there’s no work on the southern segments. Lamb seems unworried by that.
The province is “cautiously optimistic” that negotiations with Tsuu T’ina for the southwest land will conclude with a deal this year, he said.
And the southeast portion is a “very straightforward” project on land that the province already owns, he added, so construction there could start “when we have resources and if the southwest leg gets (sidetracked by negotiations) we’ll probably continue on and build the southeast leg of the ring road as soon as we’re wrapping up the northeast leg.”
Northeast partnership
Bilfinger Berger BOT, Flatiron Constructors, Graham Construction, Carmacks Enterprises and EarthTech - collectively the Stoney Trail Group – signed a 30-year contract with the province in February to design, build, operate and partially finance 21 kilometres of four- and six-lane roadway and nearly two dozen bridge structures in northeast Calgary from Deerfoot Trail to 17 Avenue SE.
The project also includes six interchanges – at Deerfoot Trail, Metis Trail, Country Hills Boulevard, Airport Trail, McKnight Boulevard and 16 Avenue NE.
The government will pay the Stoney Trail Group $300 million toward construction of the northeast section and $21 million per year once the road is open to traffic. Premier Ed Stelmach has said the arrangement, worth some $650 million to the Stoney Trail Group, “represents excellent value for taxpayers.”
The contract also includes maintenance of the roadway from Deerfoot Trail to 16 Avenue NW.
Bolfinger, headquartered in Wiesbaden, Germany, is at the centre of the project as developer. This is the company’s “first project in Alberta and represents a very important milestone for our group,” president John McArthur said when the P3 was announced. “We are looking forward to a long-term partnership with the province for the successful implementation of the project.”
Other Bolfinger transportation infrastructure projects include the Herrentunnel under the Trave River at Lubeck, Germany, completed in 2005 after less than four years of construction, and a P3 for development and maintenance of a 26-kilometre stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway that crosses Kicking Horse Pass.
Earth Tech, a unit of giant Tyco International headquartered in California, is the project’s lead designer. Graham, Carmacks and Flatiron comprise Stoney Trail Constructors, the builders in this project.
Calgary-based Graham “brings a local presence, knowledge of the local (construction) industry and its standards and the workforce – all that kind of good stuff,” Graham Infrastructure Ltd. president John Connolly says. “And it brings in particular an expertise in interchange and bridge building, which is a large component of the project.”
Graham is a force behind many Calgary-area interchange and bridge projects of recent years, including the current Glenmore Trail/Elbow Drive/5 Street SW interchange project which has a contract value of about $70 million.
The Stoney Trail Group is endeavouring to keep a lid on the dust and noise problems that are an inevitable part of road construction. Full-time water trucks travel up and down the construction site to reduce dust; all municipal and provincial noise guidelines are followed.
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