Company and People News Updates: Morrison Hershfield, Halsall Parsons Brinckerhoff, Delcan, Cast Connex, Kinetica, SNC-Lavalin

On December 3, Catherine Karakatsanis, chief operating officer and on the board of directors at Morrison Hershfield in Toronto, received one of the Women’s Executive Network’s 2013 Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Awards. The awards are presented by Scotiabank and KPMB, celebrating the professional achievements of women across the country in the private, public and not-for-profit sectors.

James Lew, vice-president with Morrison Hershfield, said in a release: “Morrison Hershfield is very proud of Catherine’s accomplishments and we congratulate her on being honoured by the Women’s Executive Network as one of Canada’s Most Powerful Women. Her dedication and leadership is an inspiration and reaffirms Morrison Hershfield’s commitment to ensuring the success and advancement of women in the engineering workplace and in the community.”

At Parsons Brinckerhoff Halsall in Toronto, John Howe has joined as vice president of strategic consulting. The division provides management, financial and technical services to public agency clients involved with the development of transit systems and other transportation infrastructure.  Howe was previously a vice president with Metrolinx, the government of Ontario’s agency coordinating transportation in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area.  At Metrolinx, he led the development of a 25-year, $50 billion investment strategy to fund transportation infrastructure expansion. A graduate of Carleton University in Ottawa, his previous positions include senior infrastructure strategy advisor to the Premier of Ontario,  director of the federal-provincial infrastructure strategy; and director of the Toronto Waterfront Revitalization Secretariat. He is on executive-in-residence at the Ivey School of Business and expert advisor at the Canada Foundation for Innovation.

Douglas Webber, executive vice-president of Halsall Associates and director of Sustainability for the Canadian division of Parsons Brinckerhoff, has been recognized in the team category as an outstanding contributor to sustainable development and clean capitalism as part of Canada’s 2014 Clean50, an award program run by Delta Management Group.

Delcan won the Global Road Achievement Award for Quality Management from the International Road Federation on November 11 for its oversight services for the Highway 407 electronic toll road in Toronto. The award is shared with the Ontario Ministry of Transportation and the 407 ETR. Delcan is currently serving as the independent engineer and auditor for verifying government safety standards for design construction and maintenance of the highway. It is also the owner’s engineer for phase one of the 407 East extension, and technical advisor for phase two.

Also in November, Rick Staples, P.Eng., vice president of Delcan’s project management business unit, was given a Special Award of Recognition by the Tunnelling Association of Canada (TAC). Staples, an alumnus of the University of Toronto, was honored for his service as past president of TAC from 2009 through 2012 and his contribution to the industry as a representative for Canada at the International Tunnelling and Underground Space Association (ITA) General Assembly since 2009.

SNC-Lavalin has been selected to design and construct the John Hart Generating Station Replacement project on Vancouver Island in B.C. Construction is expected to be complete by the end of 2018. To read about the project “A Dam Megaproject” in Canadian Consulting Engineer’ click here.

Toronto-based firms Cast Connex and Kinetica Dynamics are two companies that specialize in seismic technology and which emerged from research done at the University of Toronto’s Seismic Labs. Their work is being featured in the exhibition “Considering the Quake: Seismic Design on the Edge,” in New York City from February 13, 2014 to May 26, 2014. Curated by Dr. Effie Bouras and Professor Ghyslaine McClure, P.Eng., the exhibition was originally shown at the Toronto Design Exchange last year. It will be at the Centre for Architecture in New York City.