Saint John has released an after-action review looking into a delayed railway maintenance project that caused chaos traffic headaches in the city.
Third-party work to replace a private rail crossing along Chesley Drive heading into Ocean Steel took place during the final weekend of May.
Crews were supposed to be completed the work by 7 a.m. Monday, May 27, ahead of morning rush hour but did not wrap up until nearly noon.
That left hundreds of motorists on their way to work, school and appointments at a standstill, causing plenty of frustration throughout the city.
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Compounding the delays even more was the fact that Harbour Bridge, another key route for motorists, was down to two lanes for construction.
“Two-thirds of the traffic capacity carrying traffic east to west of the city was gone,” Tim O’Reilly, director of public works and transportation, told council this week.
Later that same evening, during council’s regularly scheduled meeting, city staff announced that they would conduct a review into what exactly happened.
What caused the delay and traffic impacts?
O’Reilly, who presented that review to council on Monday night, said several factors were identified that led to the cause and impacts of that morning.
For starters, he said, they had no idea who was responsible for the replacement project as there was no formal approval process through the city.
“For the prior six months and before that, trying to get ready for this rehab project that was happening, we were talking to New Brunswick Southern Railway all the way along,” said O’Reilly.
“Our discussions with them were happening. Our requirement that this project has to be done by seven o’clock Monday morning to open it up for rush hour traffic was all through New Brunswick Southern Railway.
“As it turned out, the entity that took responsibility for that rehab project was Ocean Steel and Construction. We never had one conversation with them about our requirements for that project at that point in time.”
The public works and transportation director also cited an inadequate communications plan which prevented information from getting out to the community that morning.
“We were scrambling to try to get answers as to why the delays were happening, when it’s going to be done, and who’s going to put some messaging out about it in terms of the entity responsible for it,” said O’Reilly.
Preventing similar problems in the future
The review also highlighted a number of actions to try and prevent something like this from happening again in the future.
O’Reilly said all projects taking place around rail crossings must now apply for and receive an excavation permit from the city.
The entity responsible for the work will be clearly defined, along with city requirements such as a project finish date and time. The city will also be able to issue penalties for non-complaince.
O’Reilly said a communications plan, complete with contacts from the railway, will be also be required as part of the permit process.
“We also have the ability to work, and we do work with collections of railways now, so not only is the railway putting out information to the public, the city staff as well are putting it out because we’ve got a broader breadth of community watching our social media,” he said.
Staff said the permit is an interim measure until they see changes to provincial and federal railways laws to define all of the rights, responsibilities and penalties associated with rail crossing rehabilitations.
