Features
Consulting Engineering Awards evolve in 1999
In the spirit of ACEC’s 75th anniversary celebrations, the 1999 Canadian Consulting Engineering Awards are set to accentuate even more the diversity of the industry, but more importantly, the accompli…
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PRODUCTS (March 01, 1999)
New products from Grinnell include the Figure 700G Grooved End Silent Check Valve (illustrated). It is engineered for silent operation with low head loss and is good for HVAC systems in hospitals and …
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Testing Water Pipes
Prestressed concrete cylinder pipe (PCCP) is used for water transmission pipelines of large diameters that often supply the water for an entire city. These pipes have a low failure rate compared to pi…
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Shack
The rusty sheets of corrugated iron lean crookedly against each other, a scattering of bricks and stones try to hold onto the shaky roof and the door dangles by a hinge. The floor is soft because it i…
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Consulting engineers and public-private infrastructure
Canada ranks fourth in the world in terms of revenue generated by consulting engineers. Consulting engineers are very often the first Canadian businesses into new markets. Very often, yet not often en…
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Speed Fiend
Imagine driving on a highway at your normal speed — let’s say 120 kilometres an hour (we’re telling the truth here). Now imagine you have no engine, no exterior, in fact … no car. You are just a fe…
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More than a white elephant
Well, we did ask “Dare we say it?” when we reported in June/July last year that the Montreal Olympic Stadium was to have a new fabric roof by January. Indeed, the roof was finished in time, only to be…
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Manners, Please
Engineers are trained to focus on technical data, scientific evidence and hard facts. Because their knowledge is governed by laws of physics which are universal, they tend to expect that differences o…
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High-speed passenger trains
A consortium of Canadian engineering and construction companies is proposing a high-speed passenger train service between Toronto and Quebec City. SNC-Lavalin, AGRA-Monenco, Bombardier, GEC Alsthom, A…
Buying Equipment
When Michael Kennedy came to see me about a week ago, he told me his firm was thinking of moving its office to a new site. “We’ve grown substantially over the last few years,” he said, “and our existi…
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Boston Central Artery / Tunnel
The Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project is the largest, most complex and technologically challenging highway project ever attempted in American history. The project will reduce traffic congestion, im…
Multilingual Y2K resource now available
Key elements of ACEC’s successful 1998 seminar series for consulting engineers on Y2K have been collected for production into hard copy and downloadable formats. With financial assistance from Industr…
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Trainspotting Opportunities in Canada’s rail system
The first time I flew from Thunder Bay to Winnipeg, I was struck by the fact that the only connections between Eastern and Western Canada were a single highway — and two railways.Perhaps to be Canadi…
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Road Bridges: Finding a better way to build
This question is important considering the deteriorating state of infrastructure everywhere. In the United States there are more than 200,000 deficient bridges, and approximately 30,000 in Canada. Bet…
New Wave
Engineers are now liable to prosecution in British Columbia under the Workers Compensation Act. Also, there is a rumour that the Workers Compensation Board has an unofficial policy to target the const…
E-commerce comes to ACEC!
Purchases of ACEC publications and contract documents, as well as event registrations and other transactions, will be conducted online via ACEC’s secure transaction server. ACEC’s E-commerce site aims…
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New $4-billion Windsor-Detroit crossing inches closer
After a protracted and troubled history, plans for a new bridge over the Detroit River between Windsor and Detroit are inching closer to reality.
Products (January 01, 1999)
Fire & Security
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DIEFENBUNKER RESURRECTED
As one of Canada’s few Modernist National Historic Sites, Canada’s Cold War Museum known as the Diefenbunker has had many unique programming and operational challenges. The foremost challenge was with the occupancy capacity limit. The museum…
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Millennium building flourishes in Europe
Britain’s centrepiece for the Millennium celebrations, the largest dome in the world, was completed last fall. Now workers are scurrying to build the extraordinary interiors of the large exhibition an…
La coopration entre le public et le priv : question de bon sens
Il y a des annes que l’industrie canadienne de l’ingnierie essaie d’liminer la concurrence du secteur public, c’est–dire des ministres qui croient, tort, pouvoir mieux faire l’interne, et …
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Public-private cooperation is good business sense
A perennial battle for the consulting engineering industry has been to eliminate competition from the public sector, that is, from government departments that mistakenly believe they can do what we do…
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Health Watch
Correct me if I’m wrong, but when most engineers were in university I doubt that they saw their future profession as a ticket to see the world. Over the past decade, however, much has changed. Not onl…
NOTEWORTHY (January 01, 1999)
U.S. plugs master’s degreeThe American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) has adopted a policy to support the master’s degree as the “first professional degree” in civil engineering. ASCE 1999 Presiden…
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Green Building: Challenge poster project
Alice Turner Branch Library, SaskatoonThe Alice Turner Branch Library on Nelson Road in Saskatoon is one of the buildings constructed under Natural Resources Canada’s C2000 environmental building prog…
New Brunswick toll road under way
A new highway in New Brunswick costing $584.4 million is to be completed in four years. The 195-kilometre road between Fredericton and Moncton is a four-lane divided road, replacing the two-lane Trans…
Project Management Guide promotes best practices
In their Engineering Services Management: Guide and Glossary, the Association of Consulting Engineers of Quebec and the Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada have produced a document which is …
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Manitoba kids find wonder in infrastructure
Thanks to donations of time and money from engineering firms and construction and manufacturing companies, children in Manitoba have their own museum to learn about engineering infrastructure. The Won…
Selling Out
About 20 years ago, Harold Bloom and two younger men founded a firm of consulting engineers. The firm has grown substantially. It now employs 15 people but the original partners have retained control….
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Northern Exposure
Since the great Ice Storm devastated eastern Canada, Ontario Hydro and Hydro-Qubec have been hard at work looking for ways to avoid a similar disaster.For two of North America’s largest utilities, th…
