Company News Round-Up: Delcan, Dillon, Hatch/HMM, AMEC

Delcan Corporation has been awarded a contract to oversee the construction of a single steel truss arch span bridge to replace the Burgoyne Bridge over Twelve Mile Creek in St. Catharines, Ontario. Delcan also helped Niagara Region with the environmental assessment and preliminary design study. The two-lane bridge is located in the city at the intersection of regional road 81 and Henrietta Street.

Also at Delcan, Rajan Philips, P.Eng. has been appointed as senior transportation engineer and manager of the company’s Waterloo regional operations. Philips was previously manager of transportation planning and development engineering with the city of Guelph.

A study by Dillon Consulting for the Government of New Brunswick has found that the Port of Saint John is well suited to become a home port for expedition-class cruise ships. The study investigated business opportunities, and it also recommended that the port install a special gangway or floating platform to accommodate the range of tides in the Bay of Fundy.

Saint John is the largest port by tonnage in Eastern Canada, and while it is already an established port of call for large cruise ships (63 calls last year), as a home port it would become the operational and supply base for the ships. Dillon’s study related to expedition-class ships on the Canada-New England circuit. Expedition-class ships are often high-end, niche-market vessels that carry up to 200 passengers.

Hatch and Hatch Mott MacDonald (HMM) have been visiting schools in Northern British Columbia, giving hands on demonstrations as a way of encouraging them to consider careers in engineering. They have demonstrated water treatment projects, ports and materials handling, tunnel, bridge and tower building. Over 650 students in grades 7 to 12 have attended the sessions, in Prince Rupert, Terrace and Kitimat. When the students were asked what careers they aspired to, they ranked health sciences first (25%), then other sciences (12%), and followed by engineering (8%).

As another outreach initiative, Hatch and HMM also presented the Minerva Foundation with $15,000 to support its “Combining Our Strength Program.” and staff will volunteer as mentors at a workshop being held in the Nisga’a villages of the Nass Valley, about 100 kilometres northwest of Terrace early this year.

U.K.-based AMEC entered a definitive agreement with Swiss-based Foster Wheeler, AG in January, outlining in more details the terms of the acquisition. Foster Wheeler shareholders are to receive 0.8998 new AMEC securities and $16 in cash for each Foster Wheeler share. They will hold approximately 23% of AMEC’s shares. The arrangement between the international engineering giants represents approximately $3.2 billion. Two non-executive directors of Foster Wheeler are expected to join the AMEC board.

See also AMEC makes offer for Foster Wheeler, click here.