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In Toronto, Canada a simple renovation of a subway stations entrance (painting, tile, basic refresh) can take several years. All the while they will rope off la

In Toronto, Canada a simple renovation of a subway stations entrance (painting, tile, basic refresh) can take several years. All the while they will rope off large sections or shut down escalators for months while there is ZERO work being done. There was a Subway station called Runnymede that took about 5-7 years and when completely you couldn't tell they did anything. I am sure it cost 10's of millions of dollars and could have been completely started and finished by a private contractor in a couple months. The city has never been manage properly because there are no consequences to the ineptness of the Politicians and bureaucracy that run it. You could complain (a lawyer friend did) and they basically either ignore or make up some story how difficult it is to lay 200 sq/ft of tile and clean an escalator...These things take years of hard work and planning.... Surprised the city doesn't come crashing down under it's own weight of dysfunction but they seem to prop it up by the endless tax or fee increases.

CydeWeys 6y ago
Private contractors aren't a solution to the problem; that's orthogonal. Lots of work goes to private contractors here, with the same results.
- mdifrgechd 6y ago
  Procurement is one of the root causes, specifically running the procurement out of a government bureaucracy where the actual tactical outcomes (refurbishing the train station in the example above) are way down the list from other priorities such as the appearance of fairness in procurement, and other government aims like job creation etc.
  - pnw_hazor 6y ago
    In the US, it common for local or federal RFP's (requests for proposals) to include a hard requirement that qualified vendors have done the same kind of project before. This usually excludes any new players from the game. How many companies build large bridges, airports, subways, railroads, tunnels, etc? Not many. It is part of the racket that discourages innovation.
    - mdifrgechd 6y ago
      Yeah, that is one facet of the overall institutional approach to procurement that treats everything like a commodity that can be perfectly substituted and comes down just to cost (and maybe a few other checkbox categories). A flexible approach that procures for outcomes but doesn't prescribe how to get there is much better at admitting creative delivery solutions, including those from new entrants. Of course past experience is still a logical thing to consider when judging the overall risks of a project. But if you look for creative solutions you can get away from "look, this entrenched legacy business is the only one meeting out experience requirements".
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  The interesting comparison being to private contractors working for private entities. I somehow doubt that Walmart is spending years and tens of millions of dollars to re-tile one of their storefronts. Which proves that it can be done, when there isn't an incentive for corruption and waste. The question is how to remove the corruption and waste.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
    You're right, Walmart isn't doing that. Part of the reason is that Walmart has essentially zero interest in building civic infrastructure. They have to just pass health & safety regulations and then they plan to do absolutely nothing more. Public buildings and infrastructure, on the other hand, have other considerations in play. Durability, civic pride, long term safety ... I travel around the US a lot and always marvel at the stuff that was built by/during the WPA. It is incredible - absurdly overbuilt by any current standards, but that very fact is at the heart of why they are still standing, still enjoyed, still viable. Nobody will be saying that about any Walmart building in 90 years.
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      The WPA overbuilt everything because its underlying purpose was to reduce unemployment, even if it meant inefficient allocation of labor, because the alternative (massive unemployment) was considered even worse. That entire system has since been discredited, because there is no actual need to allocate the labor inefficiently on purpose to reduce unemployment instead of still being as efficient as possible and just e.g. increasing the number or projects. Or even better, stimulating demand for labor by giving money directly to the general population. But the problem in this case isn't high unemployment, it's high inefficiency. A program designed to reduce unemployment by increasing inefficiency is obviously not a solution for that.
      - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
        I wasn't discussing the employment side of WPA in any way. I was talking about what they built and comparing it to contemporary big box store architecture. You're making an implicit claim that the labor was used inefficiently, which may be true. But unless that takes longevity and less easily measured attributes into account, I'm not sure you can prove that.
- pnw_hazor 6y ago
  Prevailing wage laws that are used in many areas. (added: private contractors must pay them if working in the government constructions projects) https://secure.lni.wa.gov/wagelookup/ApprenticeWageLookup.aspx https://secure.lni.wa.gov/wagelookup/ApprenticeWageLookup.as...
Waterluvian 6y ago
I don’t know your qualifications, but I doubt you were involved in the project. When I hear people upset about infrastructure giving armchair estimates of how long it should take or how expensive it should be, I just hear the uninformed project manager being outraged at the software engineers’ estimates. “And when their work was done I toured the station/software and it looked exactly the same!” I’m sure there’s bureaucratic inefficiency. But there’s always so much nonsense that gets appended to the criticism.
- sokoloff 6y ago
  What you say has some merit, of course. Does 5-7 years for a station renovation pass any kind of rough sniff test, though?
  - Waterluvian 6y ago
    My intuition tells me 5-7 years doesn’t pass the sniff test. But if I’m wrong, maybe the government can endeavour to be more transparent. Doesn’t take a lot to show us a general timeline breaking down the major tasks. My criticism is purely: we don’t know better so let’s avoid throwing numbers out there.
  - throw0101a 6y ago
    I live in Toronto: Runnymede station specifically is in a very built up area, and there's not a lot of elbow room to work. Do a Street View of 265 Runnymede: * https://www.google.com/maps/place/265+Runnymede+Rd,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/265+Runnymede+Rd,+Toronto,... * Opposite end: https://www.google.com/maps/place/260+Kennedy+Ave,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/260+Kennedy+Ave,+Toronto,+... The subway in that area was built in the 1960s using (AFAIK) a cut-and-cover method, so it's not every deep below the surface: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth#Subway_construction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth#Subway_c... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel#Cut-and-cover https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel#Cut-and-cover The original criticizing GP also assumes that it was a "simple renovation": is this a valid assumption? For example, how do you get a bunch of new elevators installed: * https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.... Drilling multiple elevator shafts seems more than a "simple renovation".
legulere 6y ago
Failures and inefficiency is just as common in private companies. It's just not as visible usually.
- lordnacho 6y ago
  Assuming we're not talking about private companies doing government projects, a private company will eventually run out of money if their projects fail. That's ostensibly why it's good to run certain things privately: a bunch of entities get a go at making the most popular widget and society gets the benefit of having various widgets available. The losers have their assets/staff recycled into the economy. Not saying it always works.
  - legulere 6y ago
    Companies can have more money and power than countries. There's not much keeping them from running into the same inefficiencies. Money is often secured through oligopolies that naturally occur, allowing enough money to be spent on inefficiency. I wonder if you have never seen waste at work?
    - lordnacho 6y ago
      Well that's what I mean by ostensibly and "not saying it always works". There's a long list of ways it can go wrong.
jungletime 6y ago
Canada is seriously declining. Have you seen grocery store prices lately? Most of the housing in smaller cities is getting very old, built to very poor standards. Requiring constant maintenance. The owners often still stuck in 25 year mortgages, fixing houses that will fall apart in less time than that. Many of Schools haven't been updated in decades, despite having asbestos insulation. I visited a former Eastern Block country this past summer. New roads, infrastructure and buildings everywhere. Built to a much higher standard too. Much better food in Restaurants too. Thinking of moving back to Europe. Considering the 300 billion deficit this year alone, declining credit ratting, higher taxes. The money for infrastructure will be hard to come by in the next decade.
- bleepblorp 6y ago
  Point of order: grocery price rises are due to the pandemic, in part due to the cost of protecting agricultural temporary workers from COVID-19. World harvests of many crops have also not been good this year[0], which has also increased prices. [0] http://www.fao.org/3/ca9803en/ca9803en.pdf http://www.fao.org/3/ca9803en/ca9803en.pdf
- namdnay 6y ago
  > I visited a former Eastern Block country this past summer. New roads, infrastructure and buildings everywhere. Built to a much higher standard too. To be slightly simplistic, that’s probably more of a reflection on the generosity of Western European taxpayers than an inherent standard of the country you visited
snowwrestler 6y ago
> In Toronto, Canada a simple renovation of a subway stations entrance (painting, tile, basic refresh) can take several years. All the while they will rope off large sections or shut down escalators for months while there is ZERO work being done. This most likely happens because of insufficient government funding for maintenance. Government budgets reset every year; governments can't take unspent program money at the end on one fiscal year and bank it for next year. There is no way to "save up" for big expenses aside from directly allocating sufficient funds in the funding legislation. That sort of lump allocation is a lot easier to get for new work. The main reason is, new work has better optics--you go from nothing to something. Maintenance, unless it changes the cosmetics, looks about the same at the end as it did in the beginning. Boring! "What did we get for all that money??" citizens ask. And maintenance is harder to budget for in a lump sum because you don't know how bad things are until you actually start the work. This is generally true of maintenance--anyone who has renovated an old home knows this. Until you open the wall, you don't know how much work needs to be done. So what you do in government is start the maintenance projects you have at highest priority, find out how bad things are, and then do as much as you can with the budget you have. It it's not enough to complete an atomic unit of work, you just sit on partially-done work until more money becomes available. And ironically, the irritation caused by unfinished work can help get you the money to finish the work. If maintenance was properly budgeted, then the subway system could afford to do a full refresh all in one continuous go. Usually it's not, so usually they can't.
throw0101a 6y ago
> There was a Subway station called Runnymede that took about 5-7 years and when completely you couldn't tell they did anything. Drilling shafts and installing new elevator is a bit more than a "simple renovation" IMHO. https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.... And that assumes that they're not doing structural fixes for a station that was built >50 years ago (Line 2, B-D, opened in 1966). * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth
bleepblorp 6y ago
Escalator and elevator refurbishment projects are extremely lengthy because most of the replacement parts needed to overhaul old escalators/elevators are no longer stock items and need to be custom made. In the worst case, parts may need to be reverse-engineered, re-designed to be compatible with current materials and manufacturing processes, prototyped, tested, and made through limited-run production. If an escalator/elevator is shut down for a few months (or years) due to refurbishment, it's because worn, but vital, parts of it have been removed for use as reference materials so replacements can be made. It is also possible that vital parts could be too worn for the escalator/elevator to operate safely until new parts have been made and installed. I'll also point out that published information on the Runnymede project indicates that the current round of construction started at the end of 2018, involved the addition of three underground elevator shafts, and is expected to be completed at the end of 2020[0]. Unless you are referring to earlier work, your '5-7 year' timeline to 'clean an escalator' is a vast exaggeration. [0] http://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp http://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.j...
- baud147258 6y ago
  When overhauling, how just replacing the escalator with a new model, which would have parts more easily available?
  - bleepblorp 6y ago
    This is frequently done when parts become too difficult/expensive to maintain, but replacement from scratch still takes many months. Pretty much every part of the west is having problems with long elevator/escalator outages these days because so many escalators/elevators were installed in the infrastructure boom of the 1960s/1970s. They're now all reaching the end of their useful lives at the same time and they all need major overhaul and/or replacement.

CydeWeys 6y ago

Private contractors aren't a solution to the problem; that's orthogonal. Lots of work goes to private contractors here, with the same results.

mdifrgechd 6y ago
Procurement is one of the root causes, specifically running the procurement out of a government bureaucracy where the actual tactical outcomes (refurbishing the train station in the example above) are way down the list from other priorities such as the appearance of fairness in procurement, and other government aims like job creation etc.
- pnw_hazor 6y ago
  In the US, it common for local or federal RFP's (requests for proposals) to include a hard requirement that qualified vendors have done the same kind of project before. This usually excludes any new players from the game. How many companies build large bridges, airports, subways, railroads, tunnels, etc? Not many. It is part of the racket that discourages innovation.
  - mdifrgechd 6y ago
    Yeah, that is one facet of the overall institutional approach to procurement that treats everything like a commodity that can be perfectly substituted and comes down just to cost (and maybe a few other checkbox categories). A flexible approach that procures for outcomes but doesn't prescribe how to get there is much better at admitting creative delivery solutions, including those from new entrants. Of course past experience is still a logical thing to consider when judging the overall risks of a project. But if you look for creative solutions you can get away from "look, this entrenched legacy business is the only one meeting out experience requirements".
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
The interesting comparison being to private contractors working for private entities. I somehow doubt that Walmart is spending years and tens of millions of dollars to re-tile one of their storefronts. Which proves that it can be done, when there isn't an incentive for corruption and waste. The question is how to remove the corruption and waste.
- PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
  You're right, Walmart isn't doing that. Part of the reason is that Walmart has essentially zero interest in building civic infrastructure. They have to just pass health & safety regulations and then they plan to do absolutely nothing more. Public buildings and infrastructure, on the other hand, have other considerations in play. Durability, civic pride, long term safety ... I travel around the US a lot and always marvel at the stuff that was built by/during the WPA. It is incredible - absurdly overbuilt by any current standards, but that very fact is at the heart of why they are still standing, still enjoyed, still viable. Nobody will be saying that about any Walmart building in 90 years.
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    The WPA overbuilt everything because its underlying purpose was to reduce unemployment, even if it meant inefficient allocation of labor, because the alternative (massive unemployment) was considered even worse. That entire system has since been discredited, because there is no actual need to allocate the labor inefficiently on purpose to reduce unemployment instead of still being as efficient as possible and just e.g. increasing the number or projects. Or even better, stimulating demand for labor by giving money directly to the general population. But the problem in this case isn't high unemployment, it's high inefficiency. A program designed to reduce unemployment by increasing inefficiency is obviously not a solution for that.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
      I wasn't discussing the employment side of WPA in any way. I was talking about what they built and comparing it to contemporary big box store architecture. You're making an implicit claim that the labor was used inefficiently, which may be true. But unless that takes longevity and less easily measured attributes into account, I'm not sure you can prove that.
pnw_hazor 6y ago
Prevailing wage laws that are used in many areas. (added: private contractors must pay them if working in the government constructions projects) https://secure.lni.wa.gov/wagelookup/ApprenticeWageLookup.aspx https://secure.lni.wa.gov/wagelookup/ApprenticeWageLookup.as...

Waterluvian 6y ago

I don’t know your qualifications, but I doubt you were involved in the project. When I hear people upset about infrastructure giving armchair estimates of how long it should take or how expensive it should be, I just hear the uninformed project manager being outraged at the software engineers’ estimates. “And when their work was done I toured the station/software and it looked exactly the same!” I’m sure there’s bureaucratic inefficiency. But there’s always so much nonsense that gets appended to the criticism.

sokoloff 6y ago
What you say has some merit, of course. Does 5-7 years for a station renovation pass any kind of rough sniff test, though?
- Waterluvian 6y ago
  My intuition tells me 5-7 years doesn’t pass the sniff test. But if I’m wrong, maybe the government can endeavour to be more transparent. Doesn’t take a lot to show us a general timeline breaking down the major tasks. My criticism is purely: we don’t know better so let’s avoid throwing numbers out there.
- throw0101a 6y ago
  I live in Toronto: Runnymede station specifically is in a very built up area, and there's not a lot of elbow room to work. Do a Street View of 265 Runnymede: * https://www.google.com/maps/place/265+Runnymede+Rd,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/265+Runnymede+Rd,+Toronto,... * Opposite end: https://www.google.com/maps/place/260+Kennedy+Ave,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/260+Kennedy+Ave,+Toronto,+... The subway in that area was built in the 1960s using (AFAIK) a cut-and-cover method, so it's not every deep below the surface: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth#Subway_construction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth#Subway_c... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel#Cut-and-cover https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel#Cut-and-cover The original criticizing GP also assumes that it was a "simple renovation": is this a valid assumption? For example, how do you get a bunch of new elevators installed: * https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.... Drilling multiple elevator shafts seems more than a "simple renovation".

legulere 6y ago

Failures and inefficiency is just as common in private companies. It's just not as visible usually.

lordnacho 6y ago
Assuming we're not talking about private companies doing government projects, a private company will eventually run out of money if their projects fail. That's ostensibly why it's good to run certain things privately: a bunch of entities get a go at making the most popular widget and society gets the benefit of having various widgets available. The losers have their assets/staff recycled into the economy. Not saying it always works.
- legulere 6y ago
  Companies can have more money and power than countries. There's not much keeping them from running into the same inefficiencies. Money is often secured through oligopolies that naturally occur, allowing enough money to be spent on inefficiency. I wonder if you have never seen waste at work?
  - lordnacho 6y ago
    Well that's what I mean by ostensibly and "not saying it always works". There's a long list of ways it can go wrong.

jungletime 6y ago

Canada is seriously declining. Have you seen grocery store prices lately? Most of the housing in smaller cities is getting very old, built to very poor standards. Requiring constant maintenance. The owners often still stuck in 25 year mortgages, fixing houses that will fall apart in less time than that. Many of Schools haven't been updated in decades, despite having asbestos insulation. I visited a former Eastern Block country this past summer. New roads, infrastructure and buildings everywhere. Built to a much higher standard too. Much better food in Restaurants too. Thinking of moving back to Europe. Considering the 300 billion deficit this year alone, declining credit ratting, higher taxes. The money for infrastructure will be hard to come by in the next decade.

bleepblorp 6y ago
Point of order: grocery price rises are due to the pandemic, in part due to the cost of protecting agricultural temporary workers from COVID-19. World harvests of many crops have also not been good this year[0], which has also increased prices. [0] http://www.fao.org/3/ca9803en/ca9803en.pdf http://www.fao.org/3/ca9803en/ca9803en.pdf
namdnay 6y ago
> I visited a former Eastern Block country this past summer. New roads, infrastructure and buildings everywhere. Built to a much higher standard too. To be slightly simplistic, that’s probably more of a reflection on the generosity of Western European taxpayers than an inherent standard of the country you visited

snowwrestler 6y ago

> In Toronto, Canada a simple renovation of a subway stations entrance (painting, tile, basic refresh) can take several years. All the while they will rope off large sections or shut down escalators for months while there is ZERO work being done. This most likely happens because of insufficient government funding for maintenance. Government budgets reset every year; governments can't take unspent program money at the end on one fiscal year and bank it for next year. There is no way to "save up" for big expenses aside from directly allocating sufficient funds in the funding legislation. That sort of lump allocation is a lot easier to get for new work. The main reason is, new work has better optics--you go from nothing to something. Maintenance, unless it changes the cosmetics, looks about the same at the end as it did in the beginning. Boring! "What did we get for all that money??" citizens ask. And maintenance is harder to budget for in a lump sum because you don't know how bad things are until you actually start the work. This is generally true of maintenance--anyone who has renovated an old home knows this. Until you open the wall, you don't know how much work needs to be done. So what you do in government is start the maintenance projects you have at highest priority, find out how bad things are, and then do as much as you can with the budget you have. It it's not enough to complete an atomic unit of work, you just sit on partially-done work until more money becomes available. And ironically, the irritation caused by unfinished work can help get you the money to finish the work. If maintenance was properly budgeted, then the subway system could afford to do a full refresh all in one continuous go. Usually it's not, so usually they can't.

throw0101a 6y ago

> There was a Subway station called Runnymede that took about 5-7 years and when completely you couldn't tell they did anything. Drilling shafts and installing new elevator is a bit more than a "simple renovation" IMHO. https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp https://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.... And that assumes that they're not doing structural fixes for a station that was built >50 years ago (Line 2, B-D, opened in 1966). * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_2_Bloor–Danforth

bleepblorp 6y ago

Escalator and elevator refurbishment projects are extremely lengthy because most of the replacement parts needed to overhaul old escalators/elevators are no longer stock items and need to be custom made. In the worst case, parts may need to be reverse-engineered, re-designed to be compatible with current materials and manufacturing processes, prototyped, tested, and made through limited-run production. If an escalator/elevator is shut down for a few months (or years) due to refurbishment, it's because worn, but vital, parts of it have been removed for use as reference materials so replacements can be made. It is also possible that vital parts could be too worn for the escalator/elevator to operate safely until new parts have been made and installed. I'll also point out that published information on the Runnymede project indicates that the current round of construction started at the end of 2018, involved the addition of three underground elevator shafts, and is expected to be completed at the end of 2020[0]. Unless you are referring to earlier work, your '5-7 year' timeline to 'clean an escalator' is a vast exaggeration. [0] http://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.jsp http://ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Construction/Runnymede_EA.j...

baud147258 6y ago
When overhauling, how just replacing the escalator with a new model, which would have parts more easily available?
- bleepblorp 6y ago
  This is frequently done when parts become too difficult/expensive to maintain, but replacement from scratch still takes many months. Pretty much every part of the west is having problems with long elevator/escalator outages these days because so many escalators/elevators were installed in the infrastructure boom of the 1960s/1970s. They're now all reaching the end of their useful lives at the same time and they all need major overhaul and/or replacement.