Still no Eglinton Crosstown opening date as officials provide small west extension update

As Ontario government officials marked another incremental step in building the westerly extension of the Eglinton Crosstown, commuters in Toronto still haven’t been provided an estimated timeframe for the opening of the main portion of the LRT line.

Officials gathered on Monday to announce the opening of an early stage of procurement (a request for qualifications) for one of four contracts related to the 9.2-kilometre extension of the existing Eglinton Crosstown LRT line to Renforth Drive from Mount Dennis station. The contract focuses on building seven stations and the connecting tracks leading to Mount Dennis station. Tunnelling began in 2022 and five kilometres have been finished already.

During a question-and-answer period at the end of the announcement, reporters pushed again for clarity on the main Eglinton Crosstown project as it goes into its 13th calendar year of construction and commissioning.

Phil Verster, the president and CEO of Metrolinx — the provincial transportation agency overseeing the private-sector consortium building the main LRT segment, said there are two major hurdles facing the 19-kilometre, 25-station line.

He said the most problematic issue currently facing the Eglinton Crosstown project is “defects” in the software that controls train movements and signals, describing the system as the “nerve centre” for the line.

Verster said the issue lies with Crosslinx Transit Solutions, the consortium building the line, and Alstom, the manufacturer of the LRT trains.

“They’re making good progress with it, but it’s not as fast as we would like it to be,” he said.

Verster said the software released just days earlier will fix “some of the defects” but the next software update isn’t scheduled to be released until June.

“Once that system is stabilized, we’ve got 20 TTC trainers that will be trained and after that there are 90 operators for TTC that will follow in three groups to be trained as well,” he said.

Once the operators are all trained and ready to go, Verster said there will be a “revenue service demonstration” where trains are scheduled to function as planned but without customers. Officials said the trains need to operate as designed for a month without any major issues. A further familiarization period is scheduled to follow that.

The second major issue involves the issuance of construction certificates — the official documents that declare the system was designed, built, delivered and tested to specifications.

“We’ve got one of the 46 construction certificates at this stage. Clearly, there [are] a lot of others in flight but this must be completed on time,” Verster said.

He added 36 of the 41 areas where customers and workers are present have received occupancy certificates. Verster also said more than 50 per cent of the system integration testing has now been completed, up from 15 per cent when he last addressed the media in-depth back in early December.

While Verster said all major construction has been completed, work is underway to address deficiencies. He cited examples of replacing tiles and address water leakage, adding Eglinton station is the biggest asset in need of work.

In February, CityNews reported how crews were digging up newer segments of sidewalks on the eastern part of the alignment within a few years of being completely rebuilt.

As for the opening date, the current, projected timeframe is still unclear. Verster repeated a refrain from past question-and-answer opportunities.

“The schedule is moving forward relentlessly and once we are within three months of an opening day, we’ll declare that,” he said.