Quebec continues to SNC-Lavalin and CIMA +

Michael Nguyen

Tuesday, 15 August 2017 22:30

UPDATE
Tuesday, 15 August 2017 22:30

Look at this article

The government of Québec sued for $ 1 million in SNC-Lavalin and CIMA+, because of costly design errors in the construction of the new Turcot interchange.

“The Consortium [of the two engineering consulting firms] has breached its contractual obligations by failing to complete its delivery of services in accordance with the rules of the art “, says bluntly the attorney general of Quebec, in a civil lawsuit made public Tuesday.

The problems date back to 2014, when the stakeholders in this project have informed the government several issues regarding its ” special features “.

Beams skewed

By following the design plans, the contractor realized that the beams were skewed, just as the anchors of the equipment supports, one can read in the court document. The consortium composed of SNC-Lavalin and CIMA+ would have admitted the fault, adding that the plans had to be revised.

“Remedial work has been carried out by the contractor to correct design errors before ending the execution of the works on the construction site,” says the government in its pursuit.

Except that all this exercise has resulted in additional costs of$ 1 Million. The contractor TNT2, inc. has also filed a claim of almost$ 8 Million to the government, in relation to problems caused by design errors.

The rules of the art

For the State, the entire fault rests with the consortium responsible for the execution of plans. As consulting engineering firms specialized in the design of structures, they would have had to pay attention to the specific characteristics of the site.

“But, it is not made by the plaintiffs no appreciation or consideration of this phenomenon in all documents of design,” says the civil lawsuit.

As the two firms have thus failed in their obligation to work “in the rules of art,” the government believes it should be entitled to claim$ 1 Million. The amount, however, could increase if the contractor’s claim was justified.

Unless an amicable agreement, the case will be presented to a judge in the coming weeks, at the palais de justice of Montreal. SNC-Lavalin has indicated that the pursuit was analyzed by its counsel and that it could not comment on it. CIMA+ has not been recalled by The Newspaper.