For the curious among you: cleanup of the new site begins

Jul 16, 2021

The new Civic development project team continues to work together as a driving force towards the completion of the Stage 2 Capital Planning process, scheduled for delivery to the Ministry of Health in early 2021.

The team is focused on every aspect of planning for the new hospital, and the way forward from finance to design, planning, technology, furniture, equipment, to name but a few activities.

One of the first steps is to work with Public Services and Procurement Canada to ensure that the cleanup of the site is done so that all future applications run smoothly.  For the curious among you, the site contains over 2000 50-year old structural footings, formally known as Franki piles, that were invented in 1909 by Edgard Frankignoul, a Belgian engineer.

In use for almost a hundred years around the world, these Franki piles are cylinder-shaped, concrete-filled steel casings, about eight feet in length. The ones on the new Civic site were installed in the 1950s to help stabilize the soil beneath federal government buildings, specifically the West Annex Building and the Sir John Carling Tower.

The West Annex Building is slated for demolition in early 2021, along with the removal of the Franki piles.

To date, a successful test removal of several Franki piles was completed in the land under the former Sir. John Carling building. The next challenge is to ensure removal of all remaining piles for site preparation and well ahead of the start of construction, scheduled in 2024.