Major bridge projects announced for Ottawa and Montreal

On January 27, the federal government announced that the joint venture of MMM Group/CIMA+ SENC have been awarded an $1.8-million engineering design contract for the structural rehabilitation of the Macdonald-Cartier Bridge in Ottawa.

Constructed in 1965, the bridge lies in the National Capital Region and the main inter-provincial bridge between Ottawa and Gatineau, Quebec. It carries around 70,000 vehicles a day, approximately 40% of the daily traffic.

The contract was “competitively awarded,” according to Public Works and Government Services Canada, who expects the design work to be completed in the winter of 2013. The work involves a seismic retrofit as well as replacing the central median, widening sidewalks and localized repairs to structural components such as the abutments and piers. Once the design work is done, construction is expected to take three years.

The federal government also officially launched the federal environmental assessment phase of a project to build a new bridge across the St. Lawrence River to replace the Champlain Bridge in Montreal. The bridge will connect the Island of Montreal to the South Shore and is the busiest crossing in Canada for cars, trucks and buses. The project has six parts and includes not just the new bridge, but also a new bridge on Nuns’ Island, reconstruction and widening of a section of Autoroute 15, and demolition of the existing Champlain Bridge.

Transport Canada is acting as the federal environmental assessment coordinator  posted a request for proposal on MERX on January 24 for a firm to carry out the technical environmental assessments, the environmental screening report and work related to public and aboriginal consultations.

A project to rehabilitate the electrical systems that control the Burlington Lift Bridge was also recently announced by Public Works and Government Services Canada. Built in 1962, the four-lane bridge provides a link between Burlington and Hamilton across the Burlington Bay Canal. The lift function allows marine traffic to move from Lake Ontario to the Port of Hamilton.