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GO Transit Electrification | Metrolinx

raptor said:
Clearly ML won't select a team having BBD as the operator.
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Metrolinx is on record stating they have no issues with Bombardier as an operator. If a BBD group makes the lowest bid, and ML selects an alternative without a strong technical reason to disqualify the BBD tender, they'll almost certainly lose that battle in court. End result might be paying damages to 2 bidding companies (team BBD and whomever was selected).
 
rbt said:
Metrolinx is on record stating they have no issues with Bombardier as an operator. If a BBD group makes the lowest bid, and ML selects an alternative without a strong technical reason to disqualify the BBD tender, they'll almost certainly lose that battle in court. End result might be paying damages to 2 bidding companies (team BBD and whomever was selected).
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Does ML have to publicly disclose the reasons why they chose consortium X vs consortium Y? Have they ever publically disclosed reasons for choosing winning bids in the past?
 
raptor said:
Does ML have to publicly disclose the reasons why they chose consortium X vs consortium Y? Have they ever publically disclosed reasons for choosing winning bids in the past?
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Absolutely. Everything in their decision making process is fully open to court demands and even press can get it via freedom of information requests.

If BBD submits lowest priced bid, and it doesn't get selected, they're going to find out exactly why that happened even if it means a multi-year battle in the courts to do it.
 
rbt said:
Absolutely. Everything in their decision making process is fully open to court demands and even press can get it via freedom of information requests.

If BBD submits lowest priced bid, and it doesn't get selected, they're going to find out exactly why that happened even if it means a multi-year battle in the courts to do it.
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Bbr will guarantee undercut the competition. And once ml goes for another bidder they will take them to court and chances are the courts will side with them and they'll end up getting the contract anyways at the expense of multi year delays and the general publics confidence. Corporations at their very best
 
cplchanb said:
Corporations at their very best
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The rules are in place largely to prevent bribing staff/politicians to select a higher-cost option with equal results.

If the bidder is capable of funding/completing the job and submits the lowest fixed-price tender, they should be selected regardless of the personal feelings of some staff.

I'm not actually sure Corporations have anything to do with Metrolinx's internal battles and contract writing incompetence. A handful of people royally messed up writing tenders/contracts within Metrolinx and have been trying to blame the companies awarded the work ever since (CN gets quite a bit of flack too).
 
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rbt said:
I'm not actually sure Corporations have anything to do with Metrolinx's internal battles and contract writing incompetence. A handful of people royally messed up writing tenders/contracts within Metrolinx and have been trying to blame the companies the work gets awarded too ever since (CN gets quite a bit of flack too).
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Bingo. The people I talk to who work on ML contracts say this over and over again. They say it most before the work has begun.... so they aren't passing the buck. They know a badly written spec when they open it.

Plenty of people in the bureaucracy who have grand ideas, but too few who have the experience and practical insights to understand what works and what won't, or who know what needs to be specified to effectively articulate how it should work.

- Paul
 
rbt said:
Metrolinx is on record stating they have no issues with Bombardier as an operator. If a BBD group makes the lowest bid, and ML selects an alternative without a strong technical reason to disqualify the BBD tender, they'll almost certainly lose that battle in court. End result might be paying damages to 2 bidding companies (team BBD and whomever was selected).
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I don't understand this process. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? How is past history in terms of delivery not factor that allows a company (Metrolinx) to veto a low bidder from getting the contract and then when getting it, negotiating a higher price. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? A company should ave the right to look at other factors not the courts. Sorry - I posted this before I ready the other posts
 
Palma said:
I don't understand this process. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? How is past history in terms of delivery not factor that allows a company (Metrolinx) to veto a low bidder from getting the contract and then when getting it, negotiating a higher price. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? A company should ave the right to look at other factors not the courts. Sorry - I posted this before I ready the other posts
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Past history is a factor. On most contracts, the bidders are pre-qualified prior to bidding and past performance, history of working on similar projects, financial means to do the work, etc. Are all factors in the scoring.

After pre-qualified bidders, to select someone other than the lowest would be really arbitrary and open the process to corruption. You could do it another way, but the selection process needs to be outlined beforehand to prevent corruption.
 
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Palma said:
I don't understand this process. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? How is past history in terms of delivery not factor that allows a company (Metrolinx) to veto a low bidder from getting the contract and then when getting it, negotiating a higher price. Why must a company go with the lowest bid? A company should ave the right to look at other factors not the courts. Sorry - I posted this before I ready the other posts
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A company can do whatever it wants. It's the government who can't. And they don't have to go with the lowest-priced bid, but they have to have a fixed criteria for how bids are going to be chosen, choose the bidder who has the best proposal based on that criteria, and be able to defend its choice if one of the other bidders complains. This is done to prevent corruption and embezzlement.
 
ssiguy2 said:
I don't think the Tories will stop RER or electrification.
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You really underestimate their dislike and/or level of understanding for public transit. I wish we have conservatives who actually valued transit, like say in the UK.
 
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Do people know Brown demolished the old party side of the Tories ? And I mean destroyed it when he was elected leader. Some optimism is due now... the Harris side is done.
 
Kitsune said:
Do people know Brown demolished the old party side of the Tories ? And I mean destroyed it when he was elected leader. Some optimism is due now... the Harris side is done.
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Did I miss something? I thought Brown had been following the Harris strategy pretty closely; he's abandoned the "Protestant values" side of the PC party and is embracing the fiscal policy side. Harris did very little on the values/social policy side. In fact, Harris was on record as being pro-abortion and appointed Keith Norton (former PC MPP, gay, fought for gay rights through the 90's) to the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

MPPs like Sam Oosterhoff (anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, females are inferior*, etc.) would have had very little power in the Harris government.

MPP Jim Wilson, best known as Health Minister under Harris during the nurse layoffs and healthcare restructuring, will almost certainly have an influential role in a Brown government. In fact, I'd speculate Minister of Finance will be on the table for him.

* This last one is my assumption. It's heavily embedded in Reformed Church doctrine which he's been educated by; women are not allowed any role in church government. The international Reformed Church community recently debated on whether to kick out the Netherlands branch (RCN) because RCN changed rules to allow women’s ordination. RCN was given until 2021 to reverse that decision. This is most interesting due to the positive role Orthodox Reformed churches had for the Womens Suffrage movement.
 
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