Ongoing construction along the Gardiner Expressway has been enervating Toronto-area drivers for many months now, with rotating lane closures exacerbating already-bonkers traffic the area, and still set to last for a few years to come.
Things have been moving ahead of schedule with the aging freeway’s revitalization, though, with the provincial government announcing over the summer that it was expediting the work, which successfully fast-tracked the overall timeline.
And though a new phase of the project kicked off early at the end of December, it looks like there could be additional snags down the line based on a new lawsuit the City is gearing up to launch.
The construction schedule for the Gardiner Expressway is changing amid concerns over brutal Toronto traffichttps://t.co/1tIn9ceJaE
— blogTO (@blogTO) July 24, 2024
Per the Star, the suit — which is at this time only a notice of action — alleges that an engineering company crucial to the early days of the project produced plans and results that could lead to a “decreased lifespan” for parts of the freeway due to “design errors and compromises.”
The City is seeking more than a whopping $36 million for damages associated with the allegedly faulty and “negligent” design work, as well as the delayed timelines and increased costs that came as a result of it.
The firm, WSP Canada, was tasked with blueprints for the first segment of the project, which spanned from Jarvis Street to Cherry Street (inclusive of some on- and off-ramps) and is already complete.
Thankfully, it doesn’t appear that the issues are anything that will cause safety concerns, and the litigation shouldn’t lead to any further deferral of the project’s completion date of 2031.
Other infrastructure initiatives that have been plagued by legal action include the Eglinton Crosstown LRT and Finch West LRT, with construction consortiums filing notices of application against Metrolinx and the Province.
