McGill engineering professor questions plan to rebuild Turcot Interchange

Saeed Mirza, civil engineer, is concerned that spending $1.5 on reconstruction of Montreal’s Turcot Interchange might be a waste of money without strict adherence to a maintenance plan provided by the engineer.

Montreal

With Quebec planning to spend $1.5 billion to rebuild the Montreal’s Turcot Interchange, Saeed Mirza, a McGill University professor of civil engineering, is concerned that the money spent on the reconstruction could ultimately be wasted unless the system is designed for a long service life and is properly maintained.

“My concern is the basic design and structural maintenance practices,” said Mirza, the former president of the Canadian Society of Civil Engineering.

“In the past, we followed the practice of design, build and forget. We don’t worry about maintenance.

“Maintenance is normally done, but when funding is tight,” he added, “maintenance is either deferred or it is not there and the result is the mess that we have. We have systems that should last 75 to 100 years and not just 40 years or less.”

Despite the reconstruction, the government will spend millions to ensure the integrity of the 40-year-old Turcot Interchange.

“Many areas of the interchange are crumbling, which has resulted in pieces of concrete falling and the corroded rebars being exposed.

Mirza urges the government to conduct a detailed study of the interchange to determine the rate of deterioration, the remaining service life and which sections can be salvaged; and to release those findings to the public.

“These are our assets,” he said. “Safety is a first concern.

“If we have to invest money, we should do it, but we have to be cognizant of the fact that some of the facilities could be salvaged.”

Mirza stresses that the new interchange construction must be built for a minimum service life of 75 years according to the current Canadian Bridge Design Code and that performance and service life be integrated into the design.

“The owner must ensure that there is a maintenance plan provided by the engineer so they can maintain the system in a very rigorous manner and that there is no deferred maintenance whatsoever,” he said.

“It might be more expensive to build initially, but the maintenance will be a lot cheaper.”