COVER STORY
Toronto’s $456-million new Union-Pearson (UP) Express
rail link is part of the most ambitious transportation
strategy in the history of Ontario – a plan
to deliver multi-directional high-order transit connectivity
to the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, a region
of more than six million people, and one that is projected to
grow to more than 8.6 million by 2031.
The UP Express, which connects the two busiest transportation
hubs of Canada’s biggest city from downtown Union
Station to Toronto Pearson Airport, was funded through
Infrastructure Ontario, which represents Metrolinx, an
agency of the Government of Ontario created to improve the
coordination and integration of all modes of transportation
in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area.
The CA$129-million AFP (alternative finance and procurement,
or public-private partnership) contract to design,
build and finance the new Airport Rail Link (ARL) spur elevated
guideway structure was awarded to AirLINX Transit
Partners JV, a consortium of Dufferin Construction and
Aecon, and included the elevated guideway between the
existing GO Georgetown South Corridor to Toronto Pearson
International Airport and other work. AirLINX chose Anchor
Shoring and Caissons Ltd. to build the foundations for the
new 3.3-kilometre spur line that veers off the Georgetown
line near Woodbine Station and into Terminal 1.
Setting up and tearing down
“This was really an elevated roadway with a rail track on it,”
crossing above major existing access infrastructure, said
engineer Derrick Speakman, vice president of Anchor.
“We were going through industrial areas, on an easement
beside Highway 409 that parallels the entrance of
that highway into the airport, so there was no residential
impact whatsoever. But the access conditions became
more complicated as we came into the restricted area of
ALL PHOTOS COURTESY OF ANCHOR SHORING AND CAISSONS LTD.
UP Express Airport Rail Link Spur Elevated Guideway Aerial view of the work site
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