Above: Geotechnical work for the new Johnson St. Bridge was underway in October of 2012 as city staff worked through competing bids for the construction project that will start soon. Rumours of the imminent demise of the project are unfounded.
Op-eds in the Victoria Times Colonist have played out some of the tit-for-tat around Victoria's Johnson St. Bridge project. Suffice to say the latest piece, similar to other agenda driven commentary, makes scant use of the facts. The Request for Proposals process is now complete and technical evaluations are taking place that will inform a recommendation to Victoria City Council which, myths notwithstanding, will make the final decision on the award of a construction contract.
Here, for your reading pleasure (or otherwise), are some rejoinders to the last op-ed on process and product.
Process
The process
has always had flexibility for numbers of tasks and business negotiations, but
always understood has been the completion dates for partnership funding and the
construction schedule afforded by fisheries windows. Extensions
have been sought by proponents, all three of whom remain interested in winning
the project, hardly indicative of a desperate for a deal scenario. Budget
limits are understood, whatever the contract language, and that is shaped by
specialized legal counsel rather than any direction aimed at fleecing
taxpayers. Project elements, particularly specific scope changes that add
new responsibilities and associated costs have been presented to council, in
open forum, and endorsed by majority votes.
At the outset
of the bridge decision process, Ross Crockford was concerned that the process
was moving forward too quickly. What’s changed?
Detailed
design and construction optimization have always been in the hands of the
successful bidders, just as indicative design is, and remains, under the
direction of the city’s consulting engineers at the MMM group. They’re
responsibility is to ensure delivery of the bridge as proposed to council and
Victorian’s in the successful funding referendum. Evaluations of
optimization strategies or details of design will be conducted, as they should
be, by expert engineering staff and consultants who are responsible to council
and the public to ensure that the bridge delivers on the fundamentals of design
and function outlined during the referendum.
Recommendations
will be forwarded to council, where decisions will be made. Councillors
will no doubt have access to information, in confidence, to protect proprietary
business interests, as they would with any project in Victoria, or any other
jurisdiction receiving multiple, competitive bids for any contract or
project. The awarding of the contract will ultimately be at the
discretion of council, and reported on at public committee and council
meetings.
The inference
that this approach to decision making on proposals submitted to the city is
unique to Victoria or to this project is not credible.
Product
The
fundamentals of the bridge are sound and the storyline that continues to be
promoted of an untested design unfounded. The technology is well
understood and refinements will be proposed to ensure functionality for a
unique bridge, as it would be for any bridge project. There are few
bridges anywhere that are not sensitive to their setting, context and
unique construction challenges. The single leaf bascule at this location is
an appropriate solution. Securing the deck mid-span is a less optimum
design than a resting span on one side for good engineering reasons, whatever
the traffic above.
The save the
bridge campaign pressed by Mr. Crockford has sought to preserve a single span
structure, making his claims on this issue less credible, if not hypocritical.
New comparisons
Comparisons
have been made with a Miami project, another strategy that failed on so many
indicators in the promotion of the “No” vote during the referendum
campaign. Like the many bridges that were offered up during the counter
petition and referendum campaigns, this new example similarly fails to provide
a credible comparison. Critics will find what they like and leave out the facts that don't support the storyline.
Miami is at the very low end of earthquake risks and codes will be significantly different. The seismic resilience of our own bridge is at the highest end and the cost differential for our project is only the incremental difference between our lifeline bridge designed to withstand an earthquake at an 8.5 magnitude (to offer to most commonly understood reference), over a less robust 6.5 event, quite different from a concept of bringing a bridge with no seismic resilience to even a modest, if not full code compliant structure. The city settled on the maximum code available to meet a variety of objectives. The cost comparisons on that element of the project are not credible.
Cost
comparisons are, in any event, out of date. The Canadian dollar was 5
cents below the U.S. dollar at the time of completion of the Miami project and
inflation would also have to be accounted for. Florida is also a
“right-to-work” state where wages are suppressed by legislative construct,
reducing some input costs, but also exposing users of this particular
procurement model to risk factors associated with higher injury and fatality
rates, as well as questionable quality and timeliness of project delivery.
The Miami
project also excludes numbers of other features and incorporated numbers of
other projects that were added, and endorsed, for the new Johnson St. Bridge
project. They include road-works on approaches, particularly on the west
side where road design has been found to generate an accident profile; elements
of a harbour pathway project that will link to the bridge and other networks
for cycling and walking; a separate bridge and trail piece to connect the new
E&N rail with trail with the Galloping Goose and a terminus for both
trails; as well as public art, bumpers to protect against vessel traffic,
movement of a secure data line and other unique elements to our project..
None of these are provided in the “accounting” comparisons made between
Victoria’s project and Crockford’s latest example.
Free association
While Mr.
Crockford characterizes the city as “desperate” for a deal, it seems Victoria
is more likely in the driver’s seat. With three competitive bidders all
eager to win this project, the city is not facing the prospect of relying on a
single bidder who can dictate price. The suggestions that city council
will act as a “rubber stamp” can’t be taken seriously. Final decisions on
contracts always rest with council, and with this project in particular, there
have often been divergent opinions on the choices before both the current and
previous council. Ross Crockford likes to characterize any decision with
which he and his media sponsors disagree as a “rubber stamp” decision.
Far from pushing on with a project on the wrong track, the bridge is moving
forward as intended, as endorsed by the council that made the choice in the
first place, confirmed by a majority of new councillors and proceeding to meet
the timeframes set in place to meet the important constraints for fisheries
windows and funding partnerships.
No amount of
hand-wringing or story-telling in support of a failed agenda will change the
facts. It was a sound decision, made by those charged with making that
choice, to choose a new bridge over the too good to be true fairy tales of a
rescue and refurbishment project. Bids have closed and a contract
will be awarded soon. Watch for more visible signs of the project to
start appearing in the harbour and on the landscape around the bridge
project. Crockford, no doubt, will continue to tilt at windmills.
