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TTC reopens contract after derailing Bombardier's bid
JEFF GRAY
From Friday's Globe and Mail
July 18, 2008 at 3:31 AM EDT
The TTC's massive plans - three years in the making - to replace its aging streetcar fleet with new low-floor vehicles hit a major snag yesterday, as the transit agency said the proposed vehicle from Montreal-based Bombardier would literally derail if rolled out onto the city's tracks.
Despite assurances from Bombardier over the past year that its Flexity design could handle Toronto's tight curves and steep hills, Toronto Transit Commission officials announced yesterday that the streetcar offered by the firm - and expected to be at least partly assembled at its Thunder Bay plant - simply would not run on the city's system.
"Effectively, the car that they bid would have derailed on Toronto streets, and they should have known this," Adam Giambrone, the city councillor who chairs the TTC, said yesterday.
The TTC announced yesterday that it is scrapping both of the proposals it has received for the $1.25-billion contract, its biggest ever.
The TTC said it would begin negotiations over the next four weeks with major streetcar manufacturers, including Bombardier, to find a design that will work.
While the failure of the bid by Bombardier, the world's largest light-rail manufacturer, was a surprise, the rejection of the bid from tiny British-based TRAM Power Ltd., tossed out for not being "commercially compliant," was not.
Mr. Giambrone said the setback would only mean a 11/2-month delay. He said the first cars of the 204 on order to replace the existing 30-year-old fleet should still arrive on schedule, with test cars to be delivered in 2010, and a new fleet rolling out in 2011-2012.
TTC and external engineers are convinced that a 21st-century, 100-per-cent low-floor streetcar can be modified to run on Toronto's 19th-century tracks, which have the tightest turns and some of the steepest hills of any light-rail system in the world, he said.
Right-leaning Councillor Karen Stintz (Ward 16, Eglinton-Lawrence), a frequent critic of the TTC, said city council needs to investigate what went wrong: "It certainly suggests there has been a problem with the process. And it is cause for concern."
Mr. Giambrone said Bombardier knowingly submitted a bid that did not meet several of the TTC's technical requirements, writing "fail" right on the document indicating that the firm's testing showed its vehicle could not push a disabled streetcar up a hill near Union Station and could not handle the city's unusually tight 11-metre-radius curves.
David Slack, a spokesman for Bombardier, said he was not aware of the specifics of the TTC's problems with Bombardier's bid.
He said the company would study the transit agency's response and was still interested in the contract: "We are surprised by the outcome, no question about that."
TTC chief general manager Gary Webster said there was nothing wrong with the TTC's specifications, and that there were no complaints before the bids were submitted. He said he believed Bombardier's design could actually work in Toronto, but with significant modifications.
The streetcar purchase - which has not yet received necessary funding from provincial and federal governments - has been controversial from the beginning, as the TTC insisted on holding a competitive bidding process after it was criticized for entering into a "sole source" deal with Bombardier for $674-million worth of subway cars in 2006 to preserve unionized jobs at Bombardier's Thunder Bay plant.
For the streetcar deal, which could eventually see the TTC order another 364 light-rail vehicles for its 120-kilometre Transit City expansion plans, the TTC instead hired a consultant and set a threshold for 25-per-cent Canadian content, a number criticized as too low by Bombardier and too high by at least one German-based major potential bidder, Siemens.
Earlier this month, the TTC revealed that Siemens - which recently announced layoffs - had declined to bid.
Siemens, which had launched a major ad campaign in Toronto, and even shipped over a life-size mockup streetcar from Europe, had pledged that its design could handle Toronto's tracks. It did not publicly say why it decided against a bid, but the firm told the TTC this week that Siemens was undergoing a worldwide corporate "refocusing" and could not commit to a large streetcar order at this time, Mr. Webster said.
A requirement that all bids be 100-per-cent low-floor - disqualifying partial low-floor models - also upset some potential bidders.
In addition to Bombardier and Siemens, Mr. Giambrone said the TTC would now approach other companies that had previously expressed interest in the contract, including French-based Alstom.
JEFF GRAY
From Friday's Globe and Mail
July 18, 2008 at 3:31 AM EDT
The TTC's massive plans - three years in the making - to replace its aging streetcar fleet with new low-floor vehicles hit a major snag yesterday, as the transit agency said the proposed vehicle from Montreal-based Bombardier would literally derail if rolled out onto the city's tracks.
Despite assurances from Bombardier over the past year that its Flexity design could handle Toronto's tight curves and steep hills, Toronto Transit Commission officials announced yesterday that the streetcar offered by the firm - and expected to be at least partly assembled at its Thunder Bay plant - simply would not run on the city's system.
"Effectively, the car that they bid would have derailed on Toronto streets, and they should have known this," Adam Giambrone, the city councillor who chairs the TTC, said yesterday.
The TTC announced yesterday that it is scrapping both of the proposals it has received for the $1.25-billion contract, its biggest ever.
The TTC said it would begin negotiations over the next four weeks with major streetcar manufacturers, including Bombardier, to find a design that will work.
While the failure of the bid by Bombardier, the world's largest light-rail manufacturer, was a surprise, the rejection of the bid from tiny British-based TRAM Power Ltd., tossed out for not being "commercially compliant," was not.
Mr. Giambrone said the setback would only mean a 11/2-month delay. He said the first cars of the 204 on order to replace the existing 30-year-old fleet should still arrive on schedule, with test cars to be delivered in 2010, and a new fleet rolling out in 2011-2012.
TTC and external engineers are convinced that a 21st-century, 100-per-cent low-floor streetcar can be modified to run on Toronto's 19th-century tracks, which have the tightest turns and some of the steepest hills of any light-rail system in the world, he said.
Right-leaning Councillor Karen Stintz (Ward 16, Eglinton-Lawrence), a frequent critic of the TTC, said city council needs to investigate what went wrong: "It certainly suggests there has been a problem with the process. And it is cause for concern."
Mr. Giambrone said Bombardier knowingly submitted a bid that did not meet several of the TTC's technical requirements, writing "fail" right on the document indicating that the firm's testing showed its vehicle could not push a disabled streetcar up a hill near Union Station and could not handle the city's unusually tight 11-metre-radius curves.
David Slack, a spokesman for Bombardier, said he was not aware of the specifics of the TTC's problems with Bombardier's bid.
He said the company would study the transit agency's response and was still interested in the contract: "We are surprised by the outcome, no question about that."
TTC chief general manager Gary Webster said there was nothing wrong with the TTC's specifications, and that there were no complaints before the bids were submitted. He said he believed Bombardier's design could actually work in Toronto, but with significant modifications.
The streetcar purchase - which has not yet received necessary funding from provincial and federal governments - has been controversial from the beginning, as the TTC insisted on holding a competitive bidding process after it was criticized for entering into a "sole source" deal with Bombardier for $674-million worth of subway cars in 2006 to preserve unionized jobs at Bombardier's Thunder Bay plant.
For the streetcar deal, which could eventually see the TTC order another 364 light-rail vehicles for its 120-kilometre Transit City expansion plans, the TTC instead hired a consultant and set a threshold for 25-per-cent Canadian content, a number criticized as too low by Bombardier and too high by at least one German-based major potential bidder, Siemens.
Earlier this month, the TTC revealed that Siemens - which recently announced layoffs - had declined to bid.
Siemens, which had launched a major ad campaign in Toronto, and even shipped over a life-size mockup streetcar from Europe, had pledged that its design could handle Toronto's tracks. It did not publicly say why it decided against a bid, but the firm told the TTC this week that Siemens was undergoing a worldwide corporate "refocusing" and could not commit to a large streetcar order at this time, Mr. Webster said.
A requirement that all bids be 100-per-cent low-floor - disqualifying partial low-floor models - also upset some potential bidders.
In addition to Bombardier and Siemens, Mr. Giambrone said the TTC would now approach other companies that had previously expressed interest in the contract, including French-based Alstom.
