2019 CANADIAN CONSULTING ENGINEERING AWARDS

Valley Line LRT Stage 1 Procurement Project Summary

The Valley Line LRT is the City of ’s largest infrastructure project and the first implementation of their new vision of mass transit. As the Owner’s Engineer, AECOM built and led the team that developed all reference design and procurement documents AECOM built necessary to build a 13km Transit and led the team system via a public- private- partnership that developed contract. The new system will be street- level, urban-friendly, and offers premium all reference public transit for the first time to southeast design and Edmonton. procurement documents necessary to build a 13km Light Rail Transit system. ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 Awards ACEC/CCE

2 Innovation

The Valley Line is Edmonton’s first step in transforming its current high-floor, largely segregated LRT network to a low-floor (street- level), urban-integrated one. This undertaking required not only a shift in local engineering thinking and practices, but also required re-educating the public and partners about an entirely new set of goals and purpose for LRT development. These goals include: into a coherent team to provide a consistent transforming the city into a denser more approach to project decisions. This was compact city, promoting transit-oriented accomplished through extensive project development, and building more sustainable, team partnering, value engineering sessions, less invasive transit infrastructure. multidisciplinary team meetings, and assisting the City personnel in understanding Furthermore, the City directed that the the different roles and approach inherent in a project be delivered as a Public-Private P3 project. Partnership (P3), a mechanism with which the City had no prior capital infrastructure Finally, AECOM guided the project through delivery experience. This meant that AECOM the P3 procurement process, maintaining not only needed to pull together a team of competitiveness between three consortia specialists to deliver the project, but that that over a year-long bid process. Unlike other team would need to align longstanding local P3 transit projects in Canada, the Valley Line LRT engineering and procurement practices LRT – Stage 1 is a complete design-build- with very new practices that were largely operate-maintain project that also includes untested in a Canadian market. partial financing from the P3 proponent and requires them to provide vehicles as part of AECOM formed Connected Transit a project scope that last 35 years. Setting Partnership, consisting of over 12 local up a contract covering all these elements and multinational firms specializing in all was the most significant undertaking of its areas of infrastructure delivery. This team kind in Canada; and all decisions required balanced local LRT project knowledge with envisioning consequences from a total life international transit infrastructure expertise cycle cost-benefit approach. The project was and innovation. The collaboration began with successfully tendered in February 2016 at an the establishment of a shared project office approximate 21% value for money savings where all project personnel worked together, over traditional procurement. including AECOM’s project management and engineers; international design, finance and legal expertise; and City staff. The next step ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 Awards ACEC/CCE was to mould this diverse group of interests 3 One of the City’s main goals is to use the new LRT to Complexity encourage a more compact urban form, while at the same time minimizing disruptions on existing neighbourhoods. This Given the Valley Line’s meant AECOM was required to engineer street-level project significant scope, there infrastructure within very tight corridors, often requiring have been numerous creative solutions to pack in rail infrastructure, overhead challenges to AECOM’s catenary, traffic lanes, and minimum-width sidewalks while team. not expropriating property or removing existing trees.

The most significant Furthermore, the project involves a significant river crossing challenge has been that passes through the middle of an environmentally engineering a street-level protected zone—the Valley. LRT in a city with one Permission to use this corridor involved the creation of a of the lowest per capita comprehensive environmental impact report which involved population densities in comprehensive mitigation plans for construction and North America (123.0 / operations, further incorporating a paleontological study, sq.km.). In other words, historical resources report, and comprehensive indigenous setting up an urban-style consultation. LRT in an environment where the average citizen Finally, AECOM also provided specialist personnel expects to be able to drive and support to assist with public engagement efforts, relatively traffic-free and participating in over 25 large-scale public meetings in an is concerned with mass effort to educate the public on the new type of LRT, how it transit ‘interfering’ with differed from Edmonton’s current LRT, and what to expect as road traffic. the project advanced. ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 Awards ACEC/CCE

4 ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 generating 20,000 indirect, directgenerating 20,000 and construction include benefits economic further project’s the model, Output Input- Canada Statistics the per As opportunities. education, and entertainment employment, to transportation effective will allow southeast Edmontonians cost- it such, As serves. it neighbourhoods of the nature and character the preserving Edmonton, still while downtown into corridor transit direct Valley new provide amore The will Line vehicles. private own residents most aresult, As fuel. and manhours funded indirect, slow, and consumes taxpayer- is area the through transit mass a result, As based. cul-de-sac and are curvilinear that to neighbourhoods leading century, mid-20th developed the largely during was Valley serve, the will which Line of Edmonton, quadrant southeast The EconomicSocial and Benefits factor for demographic). this as a key search job identified been has transit mass (as convenient industries tech and emerging knowledge-intensive workersand attract to Edmonton’s high economy) city’s the in sector competitive (a core industry Edmonton’s construction within the province, strengthen certification apprenticeship increase market, local the in trades and engineers skilled retain help also project will The of rest Canada. the in million $100 and in wages induced and leading to $1.1 billion in direct indirect 1,850 of rest and Canada, the in jobs Alberta in jobs induced and indirect 12,100 additional an generate direct, project will of the Maintenance and Operations of rest Canada. the in million $200 another and Alberta in wages induced and indirect direct, in billion to $1.3 leading Canada, in jobs 3,300 another and Alberta in jobs induced 5 Environmental Benefits

The Valley Line project focuses on mode shift, • Seeking community input into aesthetics providing citizens with premium public transit around stops and infrastructure, ensuring in conjunction with shared-use pathways and each area of the line shares character other infrastructure that encourages a more with the local community and is built using active, greener lifestyle. The auto-to-transit sustainable materials and practices. mode shift for the corridor is estimated at a ridership efficiency of 17,000 vehicle trips • It was important that SUI innovations per day-- a reduction of 5,340 metric tons of not be lost during procurement under greenhouse gasses (GHG) per year. a lowest-bid-wins model. The team accomplished this by creating a SUI Beyond efficiencies and GHG reduction, guidebook that defined sustainability however, AECOM also developed a ‘Green parameters and desired design Charter’ for the project, based on public approaches but let the proponents engagement and industry best practices, exercise creative flexibility within those which led to a core set of project principles parameters. The team then, through an called Sustainable Urban Integration (SUI). additional procurement phase, required SUI is meant to ensure that the new LRT will proponents to demonstrate they had met integrate into the communities it serves in those parameters prior to being allowed an environmentally and community-friendly to place a final bid. During debriefing, manner. Examples include: bidders noted this approach generated “true dialogue and openness” in their • Smaller scale stops, with pedestrian- interactions.

ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 Awards ACEC/CCE friendly zones around them and safe, signalized street crossings. 6 Meeting the City of Edmonton’s Needs

AECOM was required to: Transportation, and FenGate Capital. The successful bid achieved a value for • Supply a team of international specialists money savings of approximately 21% from all infrastructure project disciplines. over traditional procurement. • AECOM formed a team, Connected Transit Partnership, consisting of • Successfully transfer project risk to the over 12 local and multinational firms contractor. specializing in all areas of infrastructure • TransEd Partners assumed all of the delivery. key risks the City wanted to transfer, most notably that of schedule • Develop the necessary engineering delay, subsurface conditions, and designs and procurement readiness performance as per the Project documents in order to ensure a successful Agreement. P3 procurement that realized the City’s vision. • Remain within budget. • AECOM developed both the final • AECOM remained within the City’s Project Agreement as well as a multi- accepted budget scope for the stage procurement/bid process with duration of the procurement phase. both sustainability and technical ‘gates’--checkpoints where the • Keep to the procurement schedule. project team would review proponent • Design and procurement was submissions and provide feedback. completed on time, with RFQ being released in Q2 2014, RFP in Q3 2014, • Procure a contractor capable of delivering bids submitted Q3 2015, preferred the Valley Line project within budget. proponent identified Q4 2015, and • In February 2016, the Valley Line - successful proponent identified in Q1 Stage 1 was awarded to TransEd 2016, allowing construction to begin on Partners, a consortium consisting schedule. of Bechtel, EllisDon, Bombardier ACEC/CCE Awards 2019 Awards ACEC/CCE

7 About AECOM

AECOM is built to deliver a better world. We design, build, finance and operate critical infrastructure assets for governments, businesses and organizations. As a fully integrated firm, we connect knowledge and experience across our global network of experts to help clients solve their most complex challenges. From high-performance buildings and infrastructure, to resilient communities and environments, to stable and secure nations, our work is transformative, differentiated and vital. A Fortune 500 firm, AECOM had revenue of approximately $20.2 billion during fiscal year 2018. See how we deliver what others can only imagine at aecom.com and @AECOM.