ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[Pheidippides]

That is an exciting development!

I had thought that Victoria Park station might be the first to get an anchor wall when the update a month or so ago referred to "Construction of the Victoria Park stop will begin in mid-June" when the platform itself had long since been poured.

[Canard]

1/1 - Tuesday, July 19, 2016

   
Looks like they're starting to flush out the future pathway to the station platform at Waterloo Park/Laurier/Seagram.

   
The first anchor wall base weldment is up!

   
I can't wait to see how the ion logo looks up here - especially with it's intensity-based train proximity feature, ala Washington DC Metro!

Tom Galloway even got in on the anchor-wall action!

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Had to see for myself <a href="https://twitter.com/Canardiain">@Canardiain</a> Laurier Waterloo Park station infrastructure <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WRlrt?src=hash">#WRlrt</a> <a href="https://t.co/Qs4EZotdNA">pic.twitter.com/Qs4EZotdNA</a></p>&mdash; Tom Galloway (@tomjgalloway14) <a href="https://twitter.com/tomjgalloway14/status/755544944945790976">July 19, 2016</a></blockquote>

[BuildingScout]

Today they were doing very fine adjustments in the height of the catenary between Bearinger and University. I wonder if they are getting ready to start running some test vehicle.

Just as I suspected. From the Record article:

"He said the company plans to supply the first pilot vehicle next month"-- [Lefevre, Bombardier spokesperson]

Observe they call it "pilot vehicle", which means it will not necessarily look anything like the final rail car that will be running on the track.

[Canard]

Hang on a minute!

Metrolinx has been using the term "Pilot Vehicle" to describe the (2) FLEXITY Freedom LFLRV's they have on order for Eglinton Crosstown. The third FLEXITY Freedom is ion's first train. For most people, the "Pilot vehicle" will be indistinguishable from the finished train. Maybe the interior in all the modules won't be totally fitted out. Or the paint job may not be finished. Or a few exterior panels might be missing. I could maybe believe they'd build an A-B-C consist (not a full A-B-C-D-E set) since the first three modules make up the minimum articulated element of the train, with the end of module C capped off. But it's not like it's going to be a rectangular cart with 4 wheels for clearance checkling or something. It's much, much better than that!

Is this the article you're referring to? http://www.therecord.com/news-story/6774...-vehicles/

Our first train arrives at the end of this year, after stretching it's legs in Millhaven. Our trains 1-5 will be built in Thunder Bay, with trains 6-14 being built in Millhaven.

What I don't fully understand is what/where Metrolinx is planing to play with their 2 Pilot trains. They have no trackwork that they can do so on anywhere in Toronto. All of their streetcar lines are built to 1495 mm gauge (1435 mm is standard) so they're incompatible.

It'd be nice if the Region and Metrolinx could come to an agreement to let them play with their trains here this fall. I'd personally be very happy with that.

[Viewfromthe42]

The anchor wall at Charles and Gaukel is going up as we speak.

Two guys have been outfitting the lubricator this morning for the Francis-to-King turn this morning. The frame of the boxes that open to the surface are sitting in midair, with some PVC-looking pipe running under the tracks from them to some other location.

[Canard]

The "other location" is where the pump and line reservoir go. In some cases, one reservoir & pump box will feed two lubricators. In those cases, the box will be located midway between them.

[Markster]

Hang on a minute!
...
For most people, the "Pilot vehicle" will be indistinguishable from the finished train. Maybe the interior in all the modules won't be totally fitted out. Or the paint job may not be finished. Or a few exterior panels might be missing.

I think those kinds of things are exactly what BuildingScout meant.

What I don't fully understand is what/where Metrolinx is planing to play with their 2 Pilot trains. They have no trackwork that they can do so on anywhere in Toronto. All of their streetcar lines are built to 1495 mm gauge (1435 mm is standard) so they're incompatible.

It'd be nice if the Region and Metrolinx could come to an agreement to let them play with their trains here this fall. I'd personally be very happy with that.

Back in ye olden times, there was talk that, since these are all the same vehicles anyway, that testing for the trains would happen here in Waterloo.  It's been a little muddy, what with they way they keep getting talked about in the press as completely different things.

I think this stratification of the PR into into "Waterloo LRT vehicles" and "Metrolinx vehicles" has just been a consequence of Waterloo Region press/politicians asking about the former, and Toronto press/politicians asking about the latter, and Bombardier telling them each about their own order in isolation.  
Waterloo gets told "Pilot vehicle in October, 3 months of testing, production vehicles in 2017." (I can't remember the actual dates, I just made those up)
Toronto gets told "Pilot vehicle this year, 18 months of testing, production vehicles in 2019."
In reality, it's "Pilot vehicle in October, 3 months of testing, Waterloo vehicles enter main production in 2017, pilot vehicle continues testing, any further issues found are fixed by the time the Metrolinx order begins production in 2019"

[Canard]

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at.

As I've said before:

Bombardier makes trains 1 and 2. Those are Metrolinx' and they're their "Pilot Trains". The first of which will be done in August, and head to Millhaven.

Train 3 is our train 1. It also goes to Millhaven, and then comes here in December. Bombardier says "we're happy with how testing went at Millhaven, here's your train. Now you do your acceptance testing" and the Region starts into the tests and burn-in outlined in the Project Ageeement.

Ours is much more "off the shelf - this is what you get." The Metrolinx relationship is far more "give and take" and they'll get whatever they want for customization or changes, since it's such a huge order.

Same thing happened on the TTC FLEXITY Outlook order. Lots of ongoing tweaks and mods.

Same thing happened on the TTC Toronto Rocket (MOVIA) order. Lots of ongoing tweaks and mods.

Buying trains is totally different than buying buses, where you just say "I want 20 Nova LFS'" and they go "Ok, here" and it's done.

[Markster]

What leads you to believe that Waterloo won't have a visit from a test vehicle? (i.e. one of train 1 or 2)

[Canard]

I certainly hope that we will!

But they're not ours. They're Metrolinx'. GrandLinq is on a timeline and would have no drive or desire to risk missing a timeline and incurring a penalty because someone else was doddling or getting in the way.

If I were Metrolinx, I would be begging the Region to run trains here. Makes so much meow sense than sending a team to camp out at Millhaven for months. Toronto has nowhere to run their two trains.

[Markster]

They're Bombardier's!
Until they give them to Metrolinx.

I fully expect one of those trains to be tested here as part of the run-up to building our fleet.

[Canard]

I hope you're right. But my information so far says otherwise.

[Canard]

1/5 - Wednesday, July 20, 2016

Normally I don't get to see anything going on during the day, and only catch snippets of actual work being performed when the guys are out working after-hours or on weekends.  Today, I slept terrible, went into work super early and took off earlier than usual and went for a big bike ride along the line.  It was totally worth it!

   
First up - Duke and Queen! Right as I arrived, they were just getting ready to start pouring concrete. 2 days ago, this was wiggly steel rails in the dirt!

   
I believe someone had asked a few days ago what the black stuff was on top of the rails, before a pour. Answer: It's more duct tape! Big, wide, black duct tape. This keeps the concrete out of the flangeway, and off the rail head.

   
Here comes the concrete!

   

   
About 50 folks were working at this particular intersection. I imagine there is some impetus to get this done, so Frederick can close.

[Canard]

2/5 - Wednesday, July 20, 2016

   
Over near the Transit Terminal, the Victoria Park platform got its anchor wall weldment frame today.

   
Benton and Charles is being paved.

   
On the Waterloo Spur, detail work is being performed on the catenary.  Here, a worker is removing the temporary caribener hangers, and replacing them with the permanent ones.

   
Then, this truck comes along - with a pantograph mockup!

   
The pantograph and the device labeled "BOOM 1" are used to set the position of the contact wire.

[Canard]

3/5 - Wednesday, July 20, 2016

   
A scale plate ("ruler") on the pantograph mockup allows the position of the contact wire to be precisely set laterally.

   
I tried to get a shot to show this as best I could - here, you can clearly see the "zig-zag" layout of the contact wire. This is by design - to guarantee that the contact wire won't wear a groove in the pantograph on the train as it moves along at high speed.

   
Dwarf signals at the South end of the R&T Park Station.

   
The yard track at the OMSF just gets crazier and crazier every day.

   
These are really funky switches - they're tight radius, so there's a restraining rail - I've never seen switches like these before.