By IAN ROSS
Northern Ontario Business
Some rail shop upgrades and a multimillion-dollar car refurbishment should go a long way towards generating some future spin-off opportunities from the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission (ONTC).
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Sudbury-based Polestar Inc. and North Bay-based D.J. Venasse have been contracted to build paint bays at ONTC's rail shop. |
Earlier this year, the North Bay-based Crown corporation landed a six-year, $81-million contract with Toronto's GO Transit to refurbish 121 commuter coaches at ONTC's North Bay rail car shops.
Aggressive bidding on outside projects is one of the goals of the restructured corporation's new business plan for its rail division, to generate wealth and jobs in the North.
It is part of the Liberal government's ‘bold new course' for the debt-ridden corporation that the previous Tory government attempted unsuccessfully to sell to private hands.
"We think securing this GO contract will help us build our reputation in securing more contracts," says Steve Carmichael, ONTC's vice-president of rail and its acting president until a permanent head is named this fall.
ONTC has invested $4 million in building a new paint shop onto its existing North Bay car repair facilities, scheduled for a December completion, to accommodate the GO contract, while an expansion is being added on to their Cochrane shop to handle work shifted from North Bay.
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Steve Carmichael |
"Once we get the contract going, there will be spinoffs," says Carmichael, "but it's difficult to quantify right now."
As of mid-October, paint stripping and undercoating work had begun on the first five GO coaches in the North Bay shop.
"It's a total refurbishment," says Carmichael. "We stripped the insides down to the bare floor." Seats and windows will be replaced and air conditioning units rebuilt over the next two months. "It's a huge process."
Once the project is going full steam in the coming months, up to eight coaches will be worked on in a production-line fashion.
Local hardware and component suppliers should benefit, says Carmichael, but some parts, such as passenger seats, will be purchased from other North American suppliers through competitive bids.
As part of a major restructuring effort to restore the company to financial health this year, ONTC made early-retirement offers to more than 200 employees.
"In having to replace those people, and with the GO contract coming on as well, we're hiring in excess of 125 (mostly in the skilled trades)...a large part of it's in North Bay."
The GO contract announcement last spring began a spate of good news this year for the company.
Ontera, ONTC's phone, Internet and e-business arm in northeastern Ontario, entered into a strategic alliance with telecom giant Telus Corp. to distribute its products and services in the region.
Carmichael says ONTC is also pursuing a deal for next year to paint Canadian National Railway's auto rack cars, a significant contract, which will deliver a minimum of 75 cars to North Bay and create about 10 jobs.
The contract would require more paint bays in the shop and an additional $3-million investment.
The railway also reinvested in its passenger service with an $800,000 purchase of BC Rail's Pacific Starlight 10-car dinner train.
Mothballed for two years, the train is undergoing some renovations and upgrades before being put back on track to replace some aging rolling stock on the Polar Bear Express and Northlander trains.
Carmichael says three of the dome and dinner cars were used this year and were well received by passengers. The railway is entertaining options of using its equipment for some short-term excursion operations, such as a fall colour tour.
Besides the Northlander, Polar Bear and Little Bear trains, the 900-employee corporation operates a number of ferry and barge services in the North,
as well as some commercial properties.
