Wednesday, November 25:
Putting the timeframes into perspective. After Mattamy walked away from the acquisition of the Globe lands and it was acquired by RAD - the RioCan, Allied and Diamond joint venture. After the initial purchase, there was an extended period when all the planning, design, and municipal zoning and approval processes took place (RAD) - during which some of the buildings, including the main Globe & Mail building, were on leaseback to their existing occupants.
The leasebacks had all expired by December 31, 2016, and RAD took vacant possession of the entire site as of January 1, 2017. Demolition of the Globe buildings in particular was a slow process, first because of the need for asbestos removal and decontamination prior to the start of actual demolition, and then there was a delay required for City cut-off of the somewhat extensive water supply services to the site (needed for operation of the printing plant component).
The east end of the site proceeded where the office tower has been proceeding the fastest as there was pre-existing shoring in place, from when the Globe & Mail had actually started on development of its own new building at the Spadina and Front Street corner, prior to the decision to sell the entire site. The pre-existing shoring also was not as deep as the shoring and excavation for the rest of the site - so a faster start for the office tower on two counts - shoring already in place, and not as deep an excavation.
Excavation of the west end of the site was also slower, and there was extensive ground contamination with much of the excavated material having to go to a remediation site in the Portlands, while some of the worst contaminated material had to be trucked to Montreal for processing. The west end of the site was also slower because of the time required for excavation of the Enwave deep lake water cooling cistern - construction on the eastern portions of the site were proceeding while the well was still being excavated.
As is normal, the below grade and lower floors have a lot of special formwork - lobbies, retail areas for the first floors, and then commercial office space in the lower levels of most of the residential buildings, between the retail and the residential floors - again all of which takes time.
As noted above - almost all of the office space in The Well project has already been leased, so there is a big push on getting the office and commercial areas completed as quickly as possible - and work is obviously continuing quickly.
And now, twelve days since the last step up to the 32st Floor, the forms on the west side of the office tower have started their migration up to the 33nd Floor.
Cycle times per floor over the past months since early May have been:
Date.................Floor.........Days
May 1................19................-
May 28..............20................27
June 12.............21................15
June 25.............22................13
July 10...............23................15
July 24...............24................14
August 10.........25................18 (Includes the August long holiday weekend)
August 21.........26................11
Sept. 3................27................13
Sept. 21..............28...............18 (Includes the Labour Day holiday long weekend)
October 9...........29...............18
October 23........30...............14 (Includes the Thanksgiving Day holiday long weekend)
November 5......31...............13
November 13....32................8
November 25....33..............12 (This time period spans two weekends)
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