[nightstreak]

They just started digging today at this station.

View attachment 679309

With a hole that deep, they've been digging more than just today.

This was on Wednesday:

https://imgur.com/a/IFZbm34

Trucks have been leaving the site one after another, 24 hours a day. I spoke with someone from Metrolinx who said they're going to be digging around the clock for about a year. Around November they'll hit bedrock and begin jackhammering. This time next year, they'll be finished excavation and begin building the station from the bottom up.

This is what the tent looks like from the garden. I have to say, I'm not happy about the trees cut down but this actually works well. The acoustic siding is working well, it's rather peaceful in the garden and the remaining trees aren't in shadow for much of the day. The green shed blends in. I'll miss the sunsets after work for the next 4 years, I hope it passes fast.

I do wish someone at Osgoode Hall had some forward thinking and planted a couple of new trees about where the Sun is hitting. 4 years feels like a long time, but at least we'd have some tall trees when the shed comes down. It's going to take 20 years to get trees close to as tall as the ones they cut down, a century before they're as mature.

 

[nightstreak]

The keyhole hole is a whole lot deeper today!

https://imgur.com/a/8zVeZ9T

Holy moley that’s a lotta holes.

 

[nightstreak]

I pestered asked a foreman on site: The shaft will be 50M deep. Bedrock is about 20M from the surface. At this pace, it'll take them 2 months to reach the bedrock, another 10 months to break through that to the full depth and from there, connect the keyhole to the Queen and Simcoe south site.

It's going to get really loud by December. Presumably jackhammering will occur within a fully enclosed tent. The north side of the tent and a portion of the east side are currently still left unclad.

The tent is staying up for 2 years after the year of excavation through a period of lowering materials into the keyhole and constructing the station to ground level. The tent should be disassembled in 2029.

Presumably the park will be restored thereafter with only minor work occurring at street level to assemble the station at the corner of Queen and University. The foreman didn't know anything about the trees but said there's no way anything grows there aside from some shrubs. The top soil will be just 1 metre. The Law Society at Osgoode Hall is responsible for the landscaping.

 

[GameOnBrad]

Dig, dig, dig...

 

[flonicky]

 

[UtakataNoAnnex]

The Teal House…

 

[GameOnBrad]

Seems like they are deep underground now. Still workers around at street level.

 

[Northern Light]

Metrolinx posted this to their social feeds today: (north-east corner of University/Queen)

 

[GenerationLee]

Taken a few hours ago, from the Osgoode Hall corner (late night at work...)

 

[A Torontonian Now]

This shed is sooo massive. Today:

Nothing screams facadism quite like a disembodied facade stored down the street from where it goes:

 

[nightstreak]

Had a chat with a cop bored out of his mind watching the little side garden. They have 2 cops posted there around the clock to prevent encampments from going up. I asked why they don’t just open it to walk-through pedestrian traffic, that would prevent homelessness from settling in. He said that’s what was supposed to happen, they built a path but The Law Society and Metrolinx can’t agree on who would pay to restore the wall that has to be torn down to open the other end onto University.

Metrolinx can’t agree to pay a few thousand bucks on a multi-billion dollar project so they have pedestrians walking through mud and flag men being paid to marshal pedestrians in between dump trucks. Meanwhile the Law Society is paying god knows how much to have two paid duty cops there for 5 years because they can’t pay a few thousand bucks to rebuild a wall. The incompetence defies incredulity FFS

 

[UtakataNoAnnex]

...I mean, they are planning on putting that back at some point?

 

[CapitalSeven]

Metrolinx can’t agree to pay a few thousand bucks on a multi-billion dollar project so they have pedestrians walking through mud and flag men being paid to marshal pedestrians in between dump trucks. Meanwhile the Law Society is paying god knows how much to have two paid duty cops there for 5 years because they can’t pay a few thousand bucks to rebuild a wall. The incompetence defies incredulity FFS

Well, one organization is full of lawyers, and the other is by definition all lawyers. What do you expect? Lawyers are making money on the standoff. (And cops.)

 

[nightstreak]

...I mean, they are planning on putting that back at some point?

5 years. Half a decade is a long time. They can build a beautiful garden here with a path leading out to the court courtyard (tongue twister!) making the experience far nicer for passers through. When the walls come down, the garden will still be there.

 

[GenerationLee]

That path looks like it was designed by a team of lawyers.