Consulting engineers team up for last leg of Highway 407

Infrastructure Ontario and the Ontario Ministry of Transportation have announced three short-listed teams for delivering the final phase of Highway 407 East near Toronto.

The first phase of the tolled highway from Pickering to Oshawa is already under construction, and now phase 2 will extend the highway eastward from Harmony Road in Oshawa to Highway 35/115 in Clarington. This stretch includes eight interchanges and a 10-kilometre “East Durham Link” south to Highway 401.

The three shortlisted companies have six months to prepare proposals on how they will deliver the project, which is being done under the province’s alternative financing and procurement delivery model. Like the rest of the 407 highway, the eastern section will be tolled, with the province regulating the rate and retaining the toll revenue.

The three teams are (a) Blackbird Infrastructure Group, which on the engineering side includes Urban Systems, AIA Engineers and the Louis Berger Group; (b) East End Transportation Group, which includes AECOM, Hatch Mott MacDonald, Morrison Hershfield and exp Services; and (c) the 407E Infrastructure Group, which includes SNC-Lavalin and MMM Group.

Opened in 1997, Highway 407 currently stretches over 100 kilometres from Burlington to Pickering. Its existing sections are privately owned. It is the world’s first electronically tolled highway.