The City of Montreal and the Autorité régionale de transport métropolitain (ARTM) have filed a $5 million lawsuit once morest AECOM, an engineering consultant who developed the plans and specifications for the Pie-IX SRB project.
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According to documents filed in court, in 2016, AECOM had obtained a contract worth $9 million from the City for the realization of the plans as well as to provide professional support services to the Project Office.
A contract that had to be increased more than once, in order to “provide for contingencies and confirm the granting of the technical assistance mandate during the work”.
The Pie-IX bus rapid service project provided for the establishment of an 11 km corridor of reserved lanes, the installation of 17 stations and the development of an incentive parking lot.
In 2018, the contractor EBC obtained the contracts for carrying out the work. A few weeks later, it would have warned the members of the Project Office, which included the City and the ARTM, of problems in the plans and specifications as they were designed.
The contractor EBC estimated the problems at $1.5 million.
“Since October 2018, numerous errors and omissions have been discovered in the plans and specifications designed by [AECOM]resulting in many additional unforeseen costs”, is it noted in the lawsuit.
The City and the ARTM also accuse AECOM of having “committed multiple faults in carrying out its technical assistance mandate”.
Defects and shortcomings that have been communicated on several occasions to the consulting company, without the latter, however, following up on them, according to the lawsuit.
“The plaintiffs have suffered and continue to suffer material harm as a result of AECOM’s breaches of contract, breaches and actions,” the court documents say.
The City and the ARTM estimate these damages at $5 million.
The Pie-IX SRB should gradually enter service at the end of 2022. A second phase of work is then planned between Pierre-De Coubertin Avenue and Notre-Dame Street.