If history is any indication, it could be a week, weeks, even over a month before the Confederation Line reopens after yet another bearing-related issue shut down the entire track on Monday afternoon.
So far, the city has said it doesn’t have a timeline for reopening LRT.
It took five days to inspect every train. Seventeen loose assemblies were found on nine different vehicles, excluding the failed cartridge assembly that caused the derailment.
Then, in September 2021, the line was shut down for a month and 23 days after it was discovered that some bolts hadn’t been properly tightened during servicing after the August derailment.
Partial service resumed Nov. 12.
CBC is bringing back its LRT shutdown count-up clock. You can keep tabs on the length of the latest closure here.
Could be weeks, union head says
With inspections of each axle on every train ongoing, it could take weeks until the system is ready to run again, estimated Clint Crabtree, the president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 279, which represents OC Transpo employees.
As of Wednesday afternoon, axle hub assemblies on nine trains had been checked and none were found to be out of tolerance, Renée Amilcar, the city’s general manager of transit services, said in a memo to mayor and council.
The axle hub assembly from the light rail vehicle on which the bearing issue was discovered has been sent to the manufacturer for an investigation, according to the memo.
“I think it depends … if we decide on a Band-Aid solution or if we decide on a proper engineered solution that actually solves the problem,” he said.
“The latter will take much longer but will provide a much longer-term fix.”
Briefing on root cause expected in September
The city doesn’t yet know the root cause of the bearing issues, two years after they first came to light.
A briefing on what’s causing the bearings to fail prematurely was expected in September this year, according to Coun. Jeff Leiper, a member of the city’s transit commission. His understanding is that the briefing is still on track for that month, he told CBC Radio’s Ottawa Morning on Wednesday.
In the meantime, it appears preventative measures aren’t working.
“They thought that they would be able to run the train safely with increased inspections, and more frequent maintenance, and the slow orders that take the train much slower through portions of the track,” Leiper said.
“Clearly, and frustratingly, it looks like they may have to take yet further mitigations in order to be able to run the train, ahead of fixing the root cause of whatever that problem is that’s causing those bearings to fail prematurely.”
People wait for buses at Ottawa’s Tunney’s Pasture station the morning of July 19, 2023. It’s the western end of the temporarily closed Confederation Line, meaning more buses are passing through. (Rebecca Kwan/Radio-Canada)
Residents ‘wildly frustrated,’ ‘jumping ship’
Leiper said people in the city are “wildly frustrated” that the problem hasn’t been fixed, and that the root problem hasn’t been identified.
“I talk to people virtually every day who are giving up on transit,” he said.
“Once it’s working, I have no doubt that we’ll get people back. But it’s kind of pointless to talk about bringing people back to the system when these kinds of problems keep recurring. I don’t blame people for jumping ship.”
Coun. Wilson Lo, another member of the transit commission, told Ottawa Morning that the shutdown is frustrating for residents, but he’s glad the city is undertaking it in the interest of rider safety.
“I would much rather be dealing with their wrath because we shut down something out of precaution, than the aftermath of a serious incident,” he said.
LISTEN: The full interview with Jeff Leiper and Wilson Lo
Ottawa Morning15:38Another LRT shutdown continues
Two members of Ottawa’s transit commission react to how OC Transpo is handling another shutdown of the Confederation Line.
Kitchissippi Coun. Jeff Leiper says it’s not sustainable to have so many shutdowns affecting so many people who use LRT. (Matthew Kupfer/CBC)
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
