February 26, 2010

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION INSPECTION ONTARIO

Sections of the widened Queen Elizabeth Way are still in a two-lane configuration to accommodate surface paving.

FEATURE | Roadbuilding

Queen Elizabeth Way widening a large, complex project

DAN O’REILLY

correspondent

Not only is it the most expensive and largest conventionally tendered project by the Ontario Ministry of Transportation (MTO), the $153-million widening of the Queen Elizabeth Way in St. Catharines, Ont. may also be one of its most challenging.

The project involves widening the highway from four to six lanes along an approximately 9.4-kilometre-route from Highway 406 to the Garden City Skyway.

It includes the construction of an additional through lane in each direction with paved shoulders and a concrete tall-wall median barrier, the erection of noise walls to reduce the impact on nearby residential areas and the installation of new storm drainage and storm-water-management facilities.

As well, four new bridges were built, one widened and six rehabilitated, with another bridge scheduled for rehabilitation later this year.

Construction started in spring 2007 and is currently on track for completion this summer. Dufferin Construction Co. is the general contractor and Highway Construction Inspection Ontario is the MTO’s on-site manager.

This particular stretch of the QEW was the last remaining section that hadn’t been widened to six lanes and the extra two lanes were needed to facilitate the movement of traffic along one of the province’s busiest highways, says Calvin Curtis, area contracts engineer with MTO.

Approximately 75,000 vehicles travel along that section of the highway daily, and, during the summer tourist season, that figure climbs to 90,000. Not all the traffic is simply passing through the area.

Many local residents use the expressway for short-haul trips, says Curtis.

The heavy local usage added an extra layer of complexity to the project.

The ministry had to take into account the impact of construction along city roads and streets, as well as the expressway itself.

During the lengthy planning and design process that MTO conducted in concert with the city and Niagara Region it was decided that no two adjacent north-south streets could be closed simultaneously, he explains.

Other measures to mitigate the inconvenience to motorists included limiting lane reductions on the QEW to non-peak hours. As a result, a considerable amount of the construction had to be done at night, including the 18-month-long installation of the centre median, says Curtis.

In particular, the storm sewer had to be built in non-daytime hours because of the tight working area. Bridge demolitions were completed on weekends and stages of the bridge rehabilitations were also done at night, as were the pre-cast girder erection.

Some of the concrete deck pours and all paving operations were also overnight operations, says Dufferin senior project superintendent Dave Hainer.

With the exception of some down time during heavy rush hours, however, the QEW widening was an-almost around-the-clock operation, says Hainer.

“The project typically started on a Sunday night and work was completed night and day until Friday night.”

Two shifts of supervisors and crews were required to complete the work and sometimes specialty teams were also needed.

They generally consisted of traffic control, sewer, grading, and structure crews, he says.

At the peak of the project in the summer and fall of 2008, there was an estimated 180 workers on site, including subcontractors and Dufferin’s own employees, he says.

“Safety and getting traffic to slow down,” said Hainer, when asked about the top challenges of managing a construction project on one of the province’s most travelled highways.

Work left to complete includes some surface asphalting, the one bridge rehabilitation, landscaping and some electrical connections, he said.

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