The City of Victoria has demanded improved oversight of steel fabrication in China to prevent further delays in the replacement of the Johnson Street Bridge, project director Jonathan Huggett said Wednesday.
“It’s a massively beefed up quality assurance process,” he said. “We’re not saying there won’t be problems, but we have a process to identify them quickly, early and come to a fix before we waste time making four months worth of steel before somebody says, ‘Just a minute, this isn’t good enough.’ ”
Jiangsu Zhongtai Steel Structure of China was ordered to stop work last July after inspectors discovered significant flaws in the bridge steel, including defective welds.
“We took the view: ‘You did not follow the agreed procedures. I have no assurance that any of this steel is satisfactory and I’m not prepared to accept it as it is,’ ” Huggett said.
The decision erased four months of work, led to significant delays and pushed the bridge opening to early 2017.
In addition, the city is in mediation with its contractor, PCL Constructors, design consultant MMM Group, and sub-consultant Hardesty & Hanover, over about $10 million in cost overruns.
In March, Victoria council boosted the budget for the project by $1.5 million, to $94.3 million.
“You can imagine now the heightened tension of making sure we did this right the second time,” Huggett told reporters during a technical briefing at city hall.
He said steel fabrication resumed last month, but PCL Constructors, the company that is building the bridge, and its subcontractor, Atema, are now in charge of quality control.
The city, through Hardesty & Hanover, also has inspectors in China. “They have the ability to show up at any time, unannounced, in the plant,” he said.
In addition, Huggett will visit China this month to meet with the inspectors to satisfy himself that things are running smoothly.
“I’m fairly confident at the moment that we’re going to get good steel,” he said. “We’re doing everything conceivably possible to make sure we do.”
Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps said she is comfortable that the city is doing what it can to keep the project on track.
“We have a quality-assurance plan in place,” she said. “We saw an increase to the budget in a small way to make sure we have those people — our people, not anyone else’s people — over there, in China, watching every move.”
Helps said there are never any guarantees. “Who I am confident in is Jonathan Huggett,” she said. “He’s looked us straight in the eye and told us everything we need to know, no holds barred. So that I have confidence in.”
But Ross Crockford, one of the founders of the watchdog group, johnsonstreetbridge.org, said he continues to have concerns about project oversight.
He said the city is understandably focused on steel fabrication at the moment. “It would be a huge problem if that went sideways again.”
He argues, however, that the city should be planning for potential problems with the bridge installation and maintenance, rather than reacting after the fact.
“Who’s going to be on the hook for that?” he said.
— With files from Bill Cleverley
