Collingwood - Alliston Watermain
SNC-Lavalin/Con-Drain Consortium
This project which involved the design and construction of a water transmission line from Collingwood to Alliston was undertaken by the SNC-Lavalin / Con-Drain Consortium. The Consortium was responsible for the design, construction, financing, maintenance and operation of the project which comprised approximately 57 km. of 600 mm. dia. watermain from the Raglan water treatment plant in Collingwood to the Town of New Tecumseth's Parsons Road reservoir and pumping station facility in Alliston. Included were flow metering, line valves, air and drain valves and provision for future connections. At Collingwood, three variable speed pumps were installed in the existing wet well of the Raglan water treatment plant which was the water source for the project. In Alliston the Parsons Road reservoir was expanded by the extension of the existing pump building to accommodate three additional pumping units that supply water to the Honda plant through a 300 mm. dia. watermain.
The $27.3million contract was awarded in November 1998 following submissions from four finalists selected from the groups who initially expressed interest in the project. The final design allowed for future expansion to accommodate an ultimate capacity of 60.000 cubic meters per day.
The Town of New Tecumseth established the need for the project following studies that established that there was insufficient available ground water to meet growth demands in the Alliston area. In addition, a dedicated source was required for Honda Canada's assembly plant in Alliston to support planned expansion.
Financing for the $27.3million project came from five sources: a $5million grant from the Province of Ontario, $7million in equity from the Town of New Tecumseth, $1.3million in equity from the Collingwood P.U.C., $11.1million debt financing from OCWA and $2.9million debt financing from the SNC-Lavalin/Con-Drain Consortium.
SNC-Lavalin Engineers and Constructors were responsible for the design, approvals, construction supervision and contract administration for the project. Con-Drain Company (1983) Ltd. was responsible for the procurement of all material and plant, construction and commissioning. Con-Drain staff worked closely with the SNC-Lavalin design team throughout the route selection and design process to ensure that value engineering was incorporated in the design. The success of this approach was evident when the competitive bids for the project were released.
The project provides for an initial capacity of 13,440 cu.m. per day to Alliston with the ability to expand the pumping facilities to provide an ultimate capacity of 60,000 cu.m. per day. Initial guaranteed flows at start up were 6,000 cu.m. per day.
During the design and approval process it became apparent that the project would be subject to Canadian Environmental Assessment Act approval by Federal Government departments. As the alignment in the Angus area passed through CFB Borden, the Department of National Defense became the lead Federal agency for the CEAA process. This process and obtaining permits from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, the Canadian Coast Guard, the Ministry of Environment, the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority and others delayed construction start until early May, 1999.
Once the majority of approvals were in place, construction crews were mobilized to work on the portions of the project from Alliston along County Road 10 to Angus. Four crews from Con-Drain were involved along with two sub-contracted crews; one each from Power Contracting and the C.M. DiPede Group. Further crews could not be mobilized until the owner obtained agreements for the use of the rail easement between Collingwood and Angus. These agreements were obtained in mid-July in time to re-deploy the crews from County Road 10 to the rail line and to Collingwood. Also received in late July were the final approvals for the five major watercourse crossings; namely, the Boyne River, Pine River, Mad River, Batteau Creek and Pretty River. Crossings of these rivers were undertaken in August and completed just prior to the cut-off date of mid-September.
The rivers were crossed using a variety of methods ranging from open cut for the Pine, Mad and Batteau to boring and ramming casings beneath the Boyne and Pretty rivers. The method of crossing for each location was established after investigation of the topography and soils conditions surrounding the crossing sites. At the Mad River, for instance, the natural layout of the crossing location allowed the use of a diversion channel to redirect the river flows away from the work area. At the Pine River, however, there was no space for a diversion and a flume was installed to carry the flow.
Sheeting was pre-installed at both these locations to provide relief from the sandy soils and a trench box used between the rows of sheets.
Construction along the rail easement was constricted due to the narrow width of the easement. Pipe was delivered along the rail easement using a CAT 330 backhoe sitting on rail flat cars provided by Cando Contracting and pulled by their locomotive. The backhoe was able to walk from car to car and unload the pipe along the easement.
In two locations in Stayner and New Lowell, because of the steep embankments either side of the rail tracks, the alignment was along the centre line of the tracks. In these locations the tracks were lifted prior to construction by Cando Contracting and Con-Drain and replaced following the installation of the watermain. In each location work commenced on a Thursday evening following the passage of the Collingwood train and was completed in time to have the tracks open for the next regularly scheduled train on the following Tuesday. Throughout the work on the rail easement, there was close co-ordination between Cando Contracting, the operators of the Barrie/Collingwood Railway and Con-Drain to avoid disruption of the twice-weekly rail service to Collingwood.
Line valves were installed in 3m x 3m precast concrete chambers supplied by Con-Cast Pipe. These were installed using Con-Drain's new CAT 235 hydraulic crane.
Both PVC and Concrete Pressure Pipe were used on the project. PVC pipe was supplied by IPEX and concrete pressure pipe by Hyprescon Inc. All line valves are motorised and are connected by a SCADA system with pipeline controls located in Alliston and Collingwood.
In Collingwood, at the Raglan Street Water Treatment Plant, three variable speed pumping units complete with all necessary piping, metering equipment, electrical, instrumentation and SCADA controls were installed at the clear well within the existing plant. These pumps with a capacity of over 2000 gpm, driven by 250 hp motors, are capable of delivering the Phase 1 requirements of the project (13,400 cu.m/day) and can be expanded to provide for the higher flows required by future phases. New header piping, valves and controls were installed in the existing pump room. This plant which supplies the Collingwood water system is a "state of the art" facility equipped with a Zenon filtration system and was opened in December 1998.
In Alliston, the existing pumphouse at the Parsons Road Reservoir was extended to accommodate three vertical turbine pumps, rated at 3629 cu.m/day with 50 hp motors. These pumps provide the water supply to the Honda Plant through the 300 mm. line. The reservoir was drained and a new sump pit constructed for the pump units. A standby diesel emergency generator was installed outside the facility to provide power for the pumps in the event of a hydro failure.
The SCADA system, which provides remote controls for the system, included computer systems at the Raglan Street WTP in Collingwood and at the Parsons Road Reservoir in Alliston. It interacts with the existing SCADA systems at both these locations. Conditions at all valve and meter chambers and both pump installations are monitored constantly and communicated to the control nodes through the Bell lines. The SCADA screens provide alarms for communication failures, PLC failures and intrusion alarms along with status displays for all of the motorized valves, pumps, and other equipment.
