EDMONTON – With aerospace giant Bombardier having been awarded a contract to build LRT cars for Edmonton’s new Valley Line LRT project, the city’s mayor was asked about news Monday that the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) is calling on the Montreal-based firm to apologize over more delays in the delivery of streetcars to Canada’s largest city.
“We’ll monitor it very, very closely but for the time being, we’re in the monitoring phase,” Mayor Don Iveson said Monday.
Bombardier officials met with the TTC’s CEO on Friday to say it could not meet its revised schedule for delivering new streetcars which were supposed to start coming this month.
READ MORE: TTC demands Bombardier apologize to riders after streetcars delayed yet again
Toronto’s $1.2-billion purchase of 204 vehicles has seen multiple delays on the delivery timeline and the TTC has filed a $50-million lawsuit against Bombardier.
In February, Bombardier revealed it was part of a consortium called TransEd Partners, which was awarded a contract to design and supply LRT cars, signalling, communications, power supply and other equipment for the Valley Line LRT, which had a groundbreaking ceremony for construction on Friday.
READ MORE: Bombardier says it has been awarded part of Edmonton’s Valley Line LRT project
Bombardier said the value of its contract is $391 million.
“I actually had a conversation with one of the project leads from TransEd at the LRT groundbreaking the other day and they’re quite confident that they’ll be able to get what they need from Bombardier,” Iveson said. “I’ve also had a conversation with our own project management folks at the city that, if there becomes an issue with that, the city does have options and can shift to another vendor if necessary.”
Stage 1 of the Valley Line project will include a 13.1-km system that will run from the southeast to downtown and will include 11 stops and one station.
The Valley Line LRT is expected to be operational in 2020.
-With files from The Canadian Press.
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