Sorry state of St

Sorry state of St-Laurent station could eventually shut down its LRT tracks for weeks

Rehabilitation likely requires closing both tracks for 5-6 weeks, likely in 2028 or 2029

The City of Ottawa is planning a major rehabilitation at St-Laurent Station that could eventually force months of service disruptions and shut down LRT tracks there in both directions for several weeks — though construction work is still at least two years away.

The work is detailed in tendering documents for a tunnel renewal project the city posted online, including a project charter that says it's "assumed" that "full closure of the LRT Confederation Line for an extended period of time beyond typical engineering hours is required" in order to practically complete ceiling repairs.

A report from engineering firm Stantec says the station has been leaking at several locations, leaving puddles on the station platforms. Parts of the ceiling are cracking and breaking off, exposing corroded rebar.

It says concrete risks falling onto the platforms. That poses "a serious and ongoing risk to the traveling public," as well as to OC Transpo staff and the trains themselves. Mesh netting has been put in place to prevent injury.

Problems with water leakage go back decades. The tunnel was built for the Transitway in the 1980s and was later repurposed for the LRT. Falling concrete has actually triggered a partial service shutdown before, for a brief period in early 2024.

Now, the city is looking for a long-term solution that can extend the tunnel's life by 15 years. The upper level of the station where the buses now go has already gone through two phases of remediation work. But the third phase targetting the underground level will be especially disruptive.

St-Laurent station rehabilitation could shut LRT there for weeks in coming years

Stantec recommends work with a total estimated project cost of $1.6 million for more repairs on the upper level and $7.9 million to fix the lower level, including repairs to the tunnel, drain pipes and pedestrian bridges over the tracks.

But Stantec says accessing the high concrete ceiling will be "challenging and costly." To do the work, crews will have to remove and reinstall the overhead catenary system — the wires that power the trains — as well as utilities.

"Track closures will be required to complete work above the tracks," the report says. "Setting up and disassembling scaffolding would be time-consuming and would require long track closures."

The lower level project would likely take 11 to 13 months to finish, according to Stantec. The proposed timeline includes nine to 10 weeks of single-track closures, first shutting down one direction, then the other. Platforms are expected to close for four to five weeks each.

Worst of all, the project is expected to require a five-to-six-week period where both tracks are closed at the same time — completely shutting down train traffic through the station in both directions.

The report does discuss other options including some with different closure periods. While it said there is some possibility of doing the work during four-hour overnight shifts, it warned that doing so would drag out the project for years and prove "inefficient and costly."

While the Stantec report does not give any target date for the work, the project charter foresees design completion in December 2027 and construction completion in December 2029.

The city posted a request for proposal this week seeking an engineering firm to do that design work and provide engineering services during construction.

CBC asked the city for more information about the timeline and impact to transit users. A statement attributed to director of infrastructure services Carina Duclos said there will be no service disruptions during the design period, while construction is likely to start in summer of 2028.

"Since the detailed design is not completed, it would be premature to speculate on the scope of construction impacts or any potential service disruptions," Duclos said.

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The Stantec report was prepared in 2025 but was dated April 24, 2026. Mayoral candidate Jeff Leiper first brought it to the attention of CBC, saying it isn't acceptable for the city to sit on that kind of news for months without warning residents about significant disruptions that could delay their commutes.

"Residents have already been saying for years that they are not getting enough information from OC Transpo," he said. "A lot of the frustration that people feel about service delays and slowdowns are because the city has not done a good job of communicating in a transparent and an empathetic way."

He said a shutdown at St-Laurent would have a serious impact on the system, possibly forcing OC Transpo to run R1 service even as more public servants are in the office.

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Yet the reports are only available on a subscription-based tendering portal geared toward industry, and the details are found among several hundreds pages full of highly technical information.

"I think the feeling residents have is that things are being hidden from them," Leiper said, adding that people understand the station needs repairs but simply want transparency.

"The appropriate thing would be to talk to residents about the implications of fixing St-Laurent, rather than another document that is buried in a technical process so that residents are the last to find out, and not the first."

Duclos said the city will communicate its plans for the project and any service impacts well in advance of construction.

"Once the detailed design is complete, the City will be in a better position to provide details on the scope of the project," she said. "OC Transpo will prioritize the ongoing delivery of rail service for customers, and staff will work closely with OC Transpo to avoid disruptions to customers."

Incumbent mayor Mark Sutcliffe's campaign referred all questions about the rehabilitation project to city staff. But two other mayoral candidates echoed Leiper's concern.

Neil Saravanamuttoo said the prospective shutdown would "drop a bombshell on people's commutes."

"The fact that city hall has known about serious issues with the St-Laurent station for months, with no reporting, is a major breach of public trust," he said.

"It's a symptom of a city hall that treats the people of Ottawa as an afterthought with little regard for accountability to taxpayers."

Alex Lawson said Ottawa has let "the system that has carried us for decades fall into disrepair," referring to the former Transitway tunnel.

"The city holding on to a report since April likely won't surprise many people who have become accustomed to the city's mismanagement," Lawson said in a statement conveyed through his campaign team.

Leiper, Saravanamuttoo and Lawson all said they would make reports like the Stantec study public as soon as they're received.

Arthur White-Crummey is the municipal affairs reporter at CBC Ottawa. He grew up in Ottawa, spent years in Saskatchewan covering the courts, city hall and the provincial legislature, before moving back to his hometown. You can reach him at arthur.white-crummey@cbc.ca