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Volume 8 Issue 1 - September 2002

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  • Toronto
  • September
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BEHIND THE SCENES,

BEHIND THE SCENES, CONTINUED . A dark, distracted-looking man approaches from the direction of · the admin offices, hand extended. "Hi, I'm Jack, and that's Steven ... ". A tall red-haired man enters from the parking lot, shakes my hand real fast, says something about a banner, and keeps on going. Jack, trouper that he is, plies me with construction statistics and budget figures until Steven reappears. We try again. "This is Stevep. Metcalf of Ellis Don, he is . the projeet manager . . His office is in the trailer out in the parking lot. Did you want to talk to,hirn there or in the auditorium?" Me: Would the .trailer be OK? I . see you have seniors in the auditoriwn. Jack looks at me, wide-eyed, "They' re everywhere! " · The trailer is wonderful. Woodgrain panelling, plywood pigeonholes with curled-up plans, a fourdrawer metal file cabinet, wall calendar complete with calendar girl. Steven gestures at a folding table with a telephone, a can of . · Pepsi and a laptop computer on it. "That's my desk." Me: Now, as I wuterstand it, the . acoustic consultants - that would be R1,JSsell Johnson and Dami.an Doria of Artec Consultants Inc. of New York - decide what needs to 'be done, then the architect - in this case Tom Payne of Kuwahara Payne McKenna Blumberg Archite,cts, Toronto. - decide how it is to be done, and your job is to actually get ft done, have I got that right? Steven: That's about right. There was a design and development phase, a lot of consulting. Ellis Don bas been involved for years, . there's budget stuff and proposals (he indicates a high shelf with eight or 'ten strip-bowut books piled on) from way before I started. ' Me: I remember Jack telling me that planning started in.1995. When did you start? Steven; April 2001. Me: So, how do theplans get trans/.ated into reality?· Steven: (offers me a strip-bound book abo/4 1112" thick) That's the project specifications, they go · with the architectural drawings. He flips it open to show me a table of contents. Everything is broken into 16 categories, that's standard for the,'construction industry. (He shows me a page, there are maybe a dozen categories with numbers, like Carpentry 5800, each with several sub- categories, also numbered, list(!d below it.) Everything is in here. From· this I prepare the tender packages. Me: (confused) Tender · packages? Haven't you already got the contract? Oh ... (I blush), for the contractors to tender. Steven nods: I make up one for every trade or contractor. It has in it what we want each contractor to do, and each one also gets a general package, with general things like hours of work, time schedule, site set-up, bond requirements, everyone is responsible for their own overtime, if you hold someone .else up you have to pay their overtfme - things like that, and a set of the plans. The time schedule is the most important thrng here, everyone has to keep tG the schedule. (He opens a fold-out · page, a colour-coded plan of the hall under construction.) Here is the scaffolding, there's the garbage, here are the washrooms, the mobile crane .... Me: So you just break down the packages by the trades? Steven: I change them around, if it makes better sense. For instance, structural' steel and PHOTO: ROY THOMSON HALL miscellaneous metals are usually two separate things, but there are some places here where the· structural" steel.is attached to other metals - the canopy and where 'the stairs meet - so I put that ~in the stnictural steel package,, because it's so integrated. " fM·-·"''·· · OUR'TRADITfONAL' FRENCH.SALONf "'"''··· From the Time of the Post Impressionists · Sunday, November 3, 2002 @ 2 pm . . ; i Bass-baritone OLIVIER LAQUERRE, Soprano FREDERIQUE ' • VEZINA and TSO Concertmaster JACQUES ISRAELIEVITCH j i SPECIAL HOLIDAY SALON: ··-r··wau11r;9·rhiough'Decembef'with·rchatkovskf ! Sunday, December 1, 2002 @ 2 pm ; Mezzo-soprano KRISZTINA SZAB6, Soprano YANA IVANILOVA, Violihist ERIKA RAUM, and C~llist ROBERTA JENSEN( GERMAN SALON: ' ·········· Madness,andGenius: , ·::Ro66ifscliuiiiannanC1HugoWolf:i#aradox.,1J1· : :gxtn1m~ : §llf!i!tltJg:~n!!, ;~$t11,$Y.J:1t~rfi.ati.Yfi 'Ma.$t~!YJ Sunday, January 19, 2003 @ 2 pm i . Contralto SUSAN PLATTS and Soprapo MARTHA G UT~ . ANNUAL SCHUBERTIAD: Our 8th! Sunday, February 23, 2003 @ 2 pm , .. Tenor BENJAMIN BUTTERFIELD and Soprano ANNE GRlf>!M . . i MUSICAL DUELS: The Titans Face Off Come and Watch the "Wrestling Match": .. Britten Against Brahms and Prokofiev Versus R~chmaninov • Sunday, April 6, 2003 @ 2 pm .· Baritone JAMES WESTMAN and Soprano ELIZAB ~TH McDONALD (INNA PERKIS ANO BORiS ZARANKIN ARE OFF .CENTRE'S j9 (HOUSE PIANISTS, TOGETHER WITH HOST STUART HAM_ILTOl'-1\ September 1 - Octobe r 7 2002

Me: So the structural steel guy would do the miscellaneous metal? Steven: No, he'd still sub to a misc;ellaneous metals guy for that part, but he'd be responsible for the whole package. And I'd have a miscellaneous metals package as well, for the rest of the metal stuff. Another place like that is the gll!Zing, I put that in the package with the window framing . He'd sub it to a glazier, but when it's in the window package I know that the installation will be done right for those particular frames. Me: So all these things are let out for bids? · -~teven: Well, some are, but for a lot of the work we have preferred contractors we know and we like to use them. Where we hadn't worked with someone before we checked them out - we· visited the guy who is refurbishing the seats, we went out to the shop in London that did the bulkheads. As the project managers Ellis Don is responsible for everything and with the tight schc;:dule we didn't want to take any chances, we couldn't afford the tinle to fix any mistakes. Me: How tight was your time schedule? · · Steven: The-hall was dark for · 22 weeks, originally 20 but they increased it to 22; March 10 to August 13. During thi!.t time we worked 24 hours a day, steel guys had the crane from 7am to 3pm, wood guys had it from 3 to 11, and the demolition removal guys had it from midnight to 1am. We had several milestones, which were somewhat flexible, but the last day - that never changed. August 9. Me: With this big a job and this small a· wind.ow, I guess you did a lot in advance? Steven: Oh yes, everything we could. We built models. The tenders,' as. much as possible, the materials. The meetings, the site visits. We had a big warehouse in Mississauga, we used that to assemble two of the bulkheads, for th~ architect to approve the finishes. That would normally be dorie on the construction site but we did it there because we didn't have time in case he didn't approve it, and it also gave us a chance for our people to work out the procedure for installing them. ·(He meditates.) We were really lucky with that warehouse, we needed 40' overhead clearance for the bulkheads. We assembled the canopy there, too, to make sure everything worked. We made. a couple of changes, _we added some braces to the hoists to deal with the rotation and changed the light troughs. We did some of the on-site work in advance, too, before the 22-week dark phase. We had a "pre-dark", that was October 13 to March 9. We did preliminary work between midnight and 7am during that period. We worked in the attic putting in three layers of structural steel to support the new canopy, it weighs about 50,000 pounds, and a washroom for the workers, way up there. (Clicks on his laptop.) ' Here's a picture. And before that there was pre-pre-dark. Me: Pre-pre-dark? Steven: Some of the work was done by RTH before we officially became a construction site, we have some union issues. So they. built the counterweight shaft, that was an enlargement and extension of a stairwell that wep.t into the parking garage under the hall, to house the 100,000 pound counterweight for the canopy. (Steven smiles with pride) We started on Wednesday March 13 at midnight. That first night we took out the stage, started on the seats and rigged the sling for theoculus. I hazard a guess: 'That was the thingy on the ceiling with all the discs sticking out of it? Steven nods. The next night we finished the seats and dropped the occulus using 12 electronic hoists, all co-ordinated: It hit the stage at 3:30am. (Another photo on his laptop, · it's the oculus on the stage, looking like a downed,UFO.) By 7:00am it was cut up and 'removed. Me: Cut up? \ Steven: Yes, everything that went into or out of the hal,I went through this door. (He flashes a photo of a very ordinary double door onto the screen. "It's six-foot seven inches," he says with quiet satisfaction.) I boggle. You have a 38 tonne canopy in there. You have 23 huge wooden bulkheads. You had a mobile crane in there. · Steven flashes another picture on the screen. The same doorway is absollltely filled with I don't know, yes I do, It's the body of a crane, on its side, with no wheels. Steven: Right, we had to dismantle everything, in and out. Me: How do you keep track of everything? I don't see a lot of paper, so must be the laptop? Steven: Right. We use EDgeBuilder7, it's Ellis Don's own, the programming is done by our hiformation manager, Bruce Fleming - he's a Waterloo graduate, too. (Steven clicks up a screen with squares and boxes and tabs across the top.) It's similar to Micrqsoft Project, based on Lotus Notes; but especially designed to manage construct\on projects. It's webbased and includes a webcam. The camera was installed at the top of the hall and had electronic telemetry, any of the authorized , users. could aim the camera wherever they wanted to see any angle of the work, live. All the plans and specifications are available to them, too. (Steven clicks on tabs.) Here, minutes of , meetings, supervisors' daily field reports, schedule, specifications, change orders, RFI's, photographs of various aspects of the work, · and I can track anything, too. Me: RF/? Steven: Request for information. Here's one. He hasn't gotten back to me on that one, I can follow up. (Click, a reminder e-mail goes out.) It's instant and the informa~ tion is available to everyone involved .... Me: So, ifthe hall's done, why are you still here? Steven grins: We moved so fast that sometimes the work got done before the paperwork. There are some deficiencies and extras - · Cesaroni the drywall contractor, there is a ceiling that wasn't in the original package, that sort of thing. I' II be here until September, my next project is in Oshawa, I'll like that~ ... closer to home. • Women's Musical Club of Toronto presents its 1 osth season of ~intk~ . Daedalus String Quartet Thurs. Oct. 24, 2002 ' Gallois-Jackson-Swan Trio Thurs. Nov. 14, 2002 sponsor: WMCT Centennial Foundation Katherine Chi, piano Mezzo-Soprano Catherine Robbin Celebrating a great career Amsterdam Loeki Stardust Quartet ·Thurs. Dec. 12, _2002 Thurs. Jan. 23, 2003 Thurs. Mar . . 20 1 ·2003 All concerts are held at 1.30 p.m. in Walter Hall, Edward Johnson Building, 80 Queen's Park, (Museum Subway Station). ~ Free lectures for members precede the concerts at 12. 1,5 p.m. All Five Concerts: · $ 1 2 5 For tickets and information call: 416-923-7052 Ml!'il( IN l l-ll Al llllNOON September 1 - October 7 2002 www.thewholenote.com 27

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