ION delay: Bombardier behind on building LRT train cars

Problems assembling the train cars at Bombardier's Thunder Bay plant means the Region of Waterloo's Ion LRT is facing another delay, but one local official says this will not affect the overall completion schedule of the project.

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The first rail car from Bombardier will now arrive in October, two months later than expected. The rest will be staggered over the following seven months, with the final rail cars arriving in May 2017 four months behind schedule.

But Thomas Schmidt, commissioner of transportation and environmental services for Waterloo region, said there will be "no impact to the overall completion schedule."

Manufacturing and assembly disconnect

While Bombardier is assembling the rail cars in Ontario, the individual pieces are manufactured at one of its plants in Mexico and sent up to Thunder Bay.

Schmidt said the problems are minor and were discovered as crews were assembling test vehicles.

"One of the issues they had is simply the alignment of some of the holes, where bolts go through to bolt parts together. So, not a major issue. It's a limited area where this is, but they need to fix that," he said.

Schmidt said the problems with the region's order is not connected to Bombardier's plans to lay off 300 workers, or headaches experienced by the Toronto Transit Commission's order for streetcars.

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Bombardier did not return repeated requests for comment.

Could start service without full fleet

Schmidtsaid when the LRT build schedule was developed, it was made flexible enough to adapt in case the project hit snags.

"You don't build a schedule that is so tight that if you miss a single date you're automatically late on your delivery date," he said.

If the delays get worse, the LRT can begin service with fewer than the full fleet, he said.

"We need the 14 trains to run the system in the long term," Schmidt said. "You need to have some spares so that you can continue service while a couple of trains are in for service."

But, he added, the region could start service with just 12 trains, while the final two are put through safety tests and the required 600-kilometer burn-in period.