Company and People News Round-Up: McElhanney, Genivar, SNC-Lavalin, HATCH, AECOM

Chris Newcomb, P.Eng,, president of McElhanney Consulting Services in Vancouver has been elected to the executive committee of the International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC). Mr. Newcomb is a past Chair of the Association of Consulting Engineering Companies – Canada (ACEC), and a member of ACEC’s current Board. He was elected to the FIDIC executive at the FIDIC 2011 conference held in Davos, Switzerland October 2-15. He was one of seven candidates running for three available positions on the committee. He is also an editorial advisor to Canadian Consulting Engineer magazine.

GENIVAR has acquired Le Groupe GIROUX, a geomatics and surveying firm with 85 employees,located in Quebec. It was founded in 1991.

SNC-Lavalin’s operations and maintenance division has signed an agreement to acquire Arcturus Realty Corporation. Arcturus manages over 35 million square feet of office, retail and industrial properties across Canada. It has over 350 employees and provides services in property management, leasing, development advice and facilitiies management. The acquisition is expected to be completed by November 30.

Hatch recently completed a project to rebuild furnaces that were damaged following a fire at the Vale Copper Cliff nickel mine in Sudbury, Ontario. The rebuilding project included replacing a bell damper inlet cooling element and adding a pressure leak detection system. Vale retained Hatch to provide engineering, procurement and construction management services.

AECOM has won the contract for producing a master plan for the 2016 Rio Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil. The plan focuses on 300 acres of land in the district of Barra de Tijuca, southwest of Rio. The plan was a team effort with DG Architects, Wlkinson Eyre Architects, Pujol Barcelona Architects and IMG Sports and Expedition. The plan was chosen in a competition that involved 59 teams from 18 countries.