Bringing Them Up To Speed

You may wonder why so many people comment so harshly about mini-Gord and Anne Jarvis. It's not really their fault. They are trying.

They are constantly being compared. It is because they have Henderson's big shoes to fill.

Sure we should give them a bit of time to settle in but unfortunately there are too many important issues to be able to afford to them the luxury of learning time so Anne can write about pizzas and mini-Gord can try to discredit his colleague to salvage Edgar (aka Eddie).

Sure Gord can now write about museums and Dave Cooke and the University but they cannot! The poor man has earned the right to coast a bit. He is retired after all. They cannot do so if they want to sell papers after people cancelled their Star subscriptions.

Let me give only one exmple to demonstrate how hard their task is. Check out this DRIC press release about bidders for the DRIC Road:

• The Windsor-Essex Parkway Project-Builders Shortlisted
  Project Attracts International Industry Interest
  
  TORONTO, Oct. 8 /CNW/ - Infrastructure Ontario and the Ministry of Transportation today announced the companies short-listed to submit proposals to design, build, finance and maintain The Windsor-Essex Parkway.
  
  Over the past few months, companies from all over the world participated in a rigorous competitive request for qualifications (RFQ) process that reviewed their design, construction, maintenance and financing abilities to deliver a large and complex project, such as the Parkway.
  
  Following evaluations, five companies met the qualifications criteria and the three highest scoring ones were short-listed for the project. The short-listed companies are:
  
  - Rose City Parkway Group including:
  - Aecon Concessions is a division of Aecon Construction Group Inc.
  - Fengate Capital
  - Dufferin, a division of Holcim (Canada) Inc.
  - The Miller Group
  - MMM Group Limited
  - Macquarie Capital Group Limited
  - HOCHTIEF PPP Solution North America Inc.
  - Peter Kiewit Sons Co.
  - AECOM Canada Ltd.
  - H.W. Lochner
  - Thurber Engineering Ltd.
  - Applied Research Associates, Inc.
  - RC Spencer Associates Inc.
  - West 8
  
  - Windsor-Essex Transportation Partners including:
  - Carillion Canada Inc.
  - The Bank of Nova Scotia
  - Stantec Consulting Ltd.
  - PCL
  - Bilfinger Berger Project Investments
  - HSBC Specialist Investments Ltd (HSBC Infrastructure)
  - John Laing Investments Limited (John Laing)
  - Walsh Construction Company, a subsidiary of The Walsh Group, Ltd.
  - Parsons Corporation
  - Trow Associates Inc.
  
  - Windsor Essex Mobility Group including:
  - Dilion Consulting Limited
  - RBC Dominion Securities Inc.
  - Iridium Concesiones de Infraestructuras, S. A.
  - Acciona, S.A.
  - Fluor Canada Ltd.
  - Dragados Canada Inc.
  - Acciona Infrastructure Canada, Inc.
  - Hatch Mott MacDonald Ltd.
  - AMEC Earth and Environmental, Ltd.
  
  These companies are diverse and their team members include many local contractors and businesses - a criteria of the RFQ. In their proposals, the companies demonstrated a strong interest in partnering with local companies and businesses.
  
  Short-listed bidders will be invited to respond to the request for proposals, which will be released in December 2009. The two remaining pre-qualified companies will be held in reserve to replace any of the short-listed bidders should they be unable to participate. The companies being held in reserve include SNC Lavalin Inc. and WEP Development Partners...
  
  A winning team will be selected in 2010 to design, build, finance and maintain The Windsor-Essex Parkway, which will be owned and operated by the provincial government and it will not be tolled.
  
  The Windsor-Essex Parkway is the most significant single highway investment the province has made in Ontario's history and it will provide a major boost to the local and regional economies. The creation of 12,000 project-related jobs, with the majority in the Windsor-Essex area, is anticipated."

Our new columnists will probably comment on what is being done and we may even get a Greenlink column or two out of them.

Gord would not do that. He would merely gloat, and let everyone know it too.

Heck, he predicted exactly what would happen respecting the DRIC Road and who would win. He was bang on. For the parties who are going to lose, well it's their fault. They should have read Gord's words and knew they had no chance.

Naturally he had some help. But then again, no one ever reveals sources do they!

Gord was very generous in throwing out hints to Bloggers too for us to decipher so that we could have fun also.

It's about time already that the Newbies get some sources too and some inside info to give us the good stuff. Perhaps one of them can try and figure out what Gord already knows and write about that.

Here's a hint for them---which party did you not see on the list and why?