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Partial LRT service slated to resume Tuesday morning – Ottawa Citizen

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2 months ago

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Starting at 5 a.m. transit users will be able to take the LRT between Tunney’s Pasture and uOttawa stations.

OTTAWA. JULY 10, 2023, the last time this newspaper photographed a working train in Ottawa
OTTAWA. JULY 10, 2023, the last time this newspaper photographed a working train in Ottawa Photo by Julie Oliver /Postmedia

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Partial Line 1 service is to resume Tuesday morning, after a 21-day shutdown, OC Transpo announced Monday.

Starting at 5 a.m., transit users will be able to take the LRT between the Tunney’s Pasture and uOttawa stations. Five single-car trains will be in operation, running every five minutes. Each train can carry 300 passengers. 

Single-car trains only use half the platform. Transit users are being asked to board in the area of the platform marked with decals.

R1, R1 Express and Para R1 services will continue to operate with no changes. There’s an additional train available that can be used during peak periods.

“We are very, very confident that with single cars and the level of ridership we have we can easily handle everything,” said Renée Amilcar, Ottawa’s transit services general manager.

The $2.1-billion Confederation Line was shut down on July 17 after excess grease was found on the axle of one light rail vehicle during a routine inspection.

The original plan was to return to limited service on July 31, using single cars. But that plan was cancelled on July 28 to allow for a risk assessment to be conducted to protect the rails and the vehicles.

Last week, the city announced that it would open Line 1 in its entirety on Aug. 14 after the restraining rails, a passive safety device used to prevent derailments, were repositioned to prevent contact with the wheels of the train. The job requires doing this exacting work on 16 curves on the line.

However, the required work between the Tunney’s Pasture and uOttawa stations has already been completed. After trial running in this section to confirm that it is safe, OC Transpo decided to open that stretch, the city announced Monday.  

“The decision was made once we knew we had sufficient documentation to support the partial opening,” said Richard Holder, Ottawa’s director of engineering services.

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OTTAWA, Aug. 4, 2023: Screen shot of Richard Holder, City of Ottawa director of engineering services, from a YouTube presentation of the City of Ottawa's update about the LRT system on Friday, Aug, 4, 2023.
OTTAWA, Aug. 4, 2023: Screen shot of Richard Holder, City of Ottawa director of engineering services, from a YouTube presentation of the City of Ottawa’s update about the LRT system on Friday, Aug, 4, 2023. Photo by City of Ottawa/YouTube /jpg

Typically, at this time of year, 11 double-car trains would be in operation on the system. OC Transpo is working with the Rideau Transit Group to maximize the number of trains available.

Train riders may notice slower train speeds in the tunnel, due to a speed restriction as part of safety requirements.

At the same time, workers will continue to work on the restraining rails on the curves on the eastern portion of Line 1, where there are more curves and more restraining rails to be adjusted, Amilcar said.

It is expected that all of Line 1 — including more trains — will be in service starting Aug. 14. 

What about those troublesome tight curves?

Holder said straightening the rails is not in the cards.

“We are experiencing issues right now. But it’s not a case that we need to eliminate those curves,” said Holder.  “And it’s not the situation that we could have avoided those curves.” 

A long curve in the Ottawa LRT tracks at Hurdman Station
A long curve in the Ottawa LRT tracks at Hurdman Station on Aug. 6, 2023. Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia

The restraining rails have to be repositioned a very small amount, between one and two millimetres, so the wheels are not in contact with the restraining rails.

The question of whether the curves are a design flaw has come up a number of times. Holder said the city has received a number of public inquiries about straightening the tight curves.

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“If we had a lot of engineers designing a light rail system, we would make it straight. But we had to build a system in Ottawa. We had to connect a lot of infrastructure together,” said Holder.

The stretch on Line 1 with the tightest curves is around the Lees, Hurdman and Tremblay stations, he said.

When the system was being designed, it had to connect a number of significant pieces of infrastructure, including a crossing of the Rideau River and a large watermain pumping station just east of Hurdman that supplies the east end of the city with water, which would have been expensive and difficult to move. East of that is a bridge adjacent to the rail. At one spot, the LRT line runs next to a VIA Rail line.

That meant that the design of the system had curves that are considered relatively tight, said Holder. “But this is well within the realm of a light rail system,” said Holder.

The infrastructure and the specifications for the light rail vehicles were common for light rail systems around the world, he said.

“These systems are designed for urban areas for vehicles to actually run on downtown streets where the radius of the curves is much tighter than the curves we have around Hurdman and Lees,” said Holder.

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What about the axle hub assemblies?

In the long run, the plan is to redesign the axle hubs. The process, including creating a prototype and testing it, could take two to three years. In the meantime, the axles will be replaced more frequently. Other measures are also under consideration, including lubricating the rails.

“We’re dealing with maintenance issues right now. And the fixes that we’ve talked about and that we’ve outlined will ultimately resolve those issues,” said Holder.

The restraining rails on the tight curves are a contributing factor, but there are a number of issues to the “root cause” for the problem of the fatigue on the bearings in the hub assembly of the train.

Bus
File photo/ People catch a bus at Hurdman Station in Ottawa. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia

  1. This gopher had the tracks between Pimisi and Bayview stations to himself as Ottawa's LRT system remained shutdown on Tuesday.

    Deachman: How do you spell frustration? Transit riders offer entries for the Ottawa Light Rail Thesaurus

  2. Glen Gower, Stittsville councillor and the chair of the City of Ottawa's transit commission.

    The pressure is on to compensate transit users for weeks of frustration. But how?

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Clean electricity regulations can be tweaked, but Alberta won't get special deal: Guilbeault – National Post

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September 30, 2023

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Canada's economic growth misses forecasts, backing interest rate pause – Financial Post

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September 29, 2023

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Strikes at 2 more U.S. auto factories to start Friday as UAW ratchets up pressure

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13 hours ago

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September 29, 2023

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A picketer holds a "UAW On Strike" sign while attempting to block a truck from entering the Ford Motor Co. Michigan Assembly plant in Wayne, Michigan
A picketer holds a ‘UAW On Strike’ sign while attempting to block a truck from entering the Ford Motor Co. Michigan Assembly plant in Wayne, Mich., earlier this month. The autoworkers’ union says 7,000 more workers at two GM and Ford plants are going to walk off the job on Friday at noon ET. (Emily Elconin/Bloomberg)

The United Auto Workers union is expanding its strike against U.S. automakers to two new plants, as 7,000 workers at a Ford plant in Chicago and a General Motors assembly factory near Lansing, Mich., will walk off the job at midday on Friday.

Union president Shawn Fain told workers on a video appearance Friday that negotiations haven’t broken down but Ford and GM have refused to make meaningful progress.

“Despite our willingness to bargain, Ford and GM have refused to make meaningful progress,” Fain said. “That’s why at noon eastern we will expand our strike to these two companies.”

“Not a single wheel will turn without us,” Fain said, adding that the 7,000 soon-to-be picketers are the “next wave of reinforcements.”

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Stellantis, the third major automaker targeted by the union, and the maker of brands like Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge, was spared further action, as Fain said the company’s management has made significant concessions on things like a cost-of-living allowance and a freeze on outsourcing.

The Ford plant in Chicago makes the Explorer and Police Interceptor, as well as the Lincoln Aviator SUV.

The GM plant in Michigan’s Delta Township near Lansing manufactures large crossover SUVs such as the Chevrolet Traverse.

The two new plants join 41 other factories and distribution centres already seeing job action.

So far, the impact on Canada’s auto industry has been muted, as none of the idled factories are major users of Canadian-made components.

Biden says striking autoworkers deserve a ‘significant’ raise

U.S. President Joe Biden visited the United Auto Workers picket line in Detroit on Tuesday, saying the workers deserve a significant raise after sacrifices made during the 2008 financial crisis. Auto companies are doing ‘incredibly well,’ Biden said, ‘and you should be doing incredibly well, too.’

Edward Moya, a strategist with foreign exchange firm Oanda, says that despite the expanded job action, the strike seems to be nearing an “endgame” as the two sides are clearly making slow but steady progress.

“Yesterday, the UAW said they are targeting a 30 per cent pay raise, which is down from the 46 per cent they were asking for in early September,” he said. “Automakers have raised their offer to 20 per cent but were not offering much on retirement benefits. The longer this drags, the more both sides lose, so a deal should be reached in the next week or two.”

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