Toronto Royal Ontario Museum | ?m | ?s | Daniel Libeskind

Just a little accuracy note, if you run a crew 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, you actually need to pay double time on weekdays for any shift longer than 8 hours. That means 84 hours of labour actually costs the equivalent of 128. 128 hours, at $40/hr, for a crew of 90 men would put you closer to $450,000 a week payroll, not counting crane rental (a crane that size is costing them a couple thousand a day, easy), boom rentals (they probably have a dozen zoom booms there), backcharges, and fines.

The other thing that's going to be interesting are the deficiencies. What I've heard is that the design is awful, and there's big gaping holes in the air seal in some places, especially down in the gulleys where the crystals meet. My guess is that once they finish they're going to have to go back and tear it apart so that they can get in there to fix it.

Basically, I'd say there's not a chance in hell that they're going to make anything on the ROM, and in all likelihood I'd say they're bleeding bad right now. The word going around is that the contractor has had enough with Toronto, and they're never going to bid anything here again (the only other job they've done in Toronto, the Opera House, was another disaster). Given that they're taking such a hit, and given that they never want to work here again anyways, I'm kind of curious how much worse things need to get before they just say to hell with it and walk away.
 
clarification

^Are you refering to the design of the building or the design of the cladding system?
 
^

The cladding system, not the overall architectural design.
 
Forgive my ignorance, but what is the role of the contractor in the construction of a building like the ROM and what about this city is different from elsewhere that would cause them to suffer losses?
 
"the only other job they've done in Toronto, the Opera House, was another disaster"

Were they the general contractor on the two projects or were they subcontracted? What happened that was so disastrous on the Four Seasons Centre?
 
It's gigantic and white. All they need to add now are the ears and trunk...
 
Maybe install Carsten Holler's giant slides in the Crystal for a few months, once the Tate Modern has finished with them?
 
It was weird walking by it late Sunday night and hearing the voice of Art Bell eminating from within the structure.
 
The word going around is that the contractor has had enough with Toronto, and they're never going to bid anything here again
Click to expand...

Contractor is to accustomed to building cereal box style buildings? What would be unique about Toronto that the contractor wasn't prepared for?
 
I don't think it was anything about Toronto specifically, it was more the way things played out for them here. They're a very large company (Number two worldwide, as far as curtainwall goes, I believe), but they'd never done anything in Toronto. This was a new market for them, and they were eager to get a toehold so they went after a bunch of high-profile jobs (Opera House, ROM, AGO), and then they lowballed all of their estimates to make sure they'd get the contracts. Now for the second time they're getting bitten by the unrealistic price tag that they set for themselves.
 
I dunno if I'd go so far as to say it was anyone's fault, mostly it was just bad luck. But one way or another, it must've left a pretty bad taste in their mouth because it looks like they're pulling out of Toronto. Bay-Adelaide was theirs for the taking, and that one was a guaranteed money-maker (a big dumb box, nearly impossible for it to go wrong) but they didn't pursue it.
 
Didn't they also work on the Denver project? I wonder what was so different about their experience in that city.

It would be a shame if they didn't pursue other interests here. Their input would be quite valuable I'm sure.
 
Bog:

I don't think the cladding for the Denver project is nearly as complex - it seems to consist of nothing more than titanium cladding over vapour barrier covered drywall.

AoD
 
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