Contractor didn't properly erase road markings raised in Westboro crash trial, inquest told
Lines contributed to January 2019 crash, driver's trial defence team says
A "construction deficiency" that occurred months before the fatal Westboro bus crash is resurfacing at the coroner's inquest into the January 2019 tragedy.
On that afternoon, a packed OC Transpo double-decker slammed into the Westboro Transitway bus shelter. Three people — Judy Booth, Bruce Thomlinson and Anja Van Beek — died in the crash. Many others were injured, triggering a flurry of lawsuits.
While the city accepted civil responsibility for the crash, the bus driver was charged with 38 counts of dangerous driving causing death or bodily harm. She was acquitted of all of them in a judge-only trial in 2021.
At the trial, the driver's defence team argued that temporary orange road markings leading to the station were confusing and played a hand in what happened.
The lines had been painted in the summer of 2018 to redirect traffic during lane closures. But by the time of the crash, they had become visible again because replacement black paint had worn off.
No city employees had complained about them, and several drivers rode the same route without issue, the inquest has heard.
But the road markings took centre stage in the second half of the inquest's fourth day on Monday.
Questions about inspection
Bin Wang, the city's senior engineer of infrastructure projects, testified that the construction contractor — who no one at the inquest has named — was supposed to have mechanically removed the orange lines at the end of the construction period in late 2018, using a method such as sandblasting or asphalt grinding.
That did not happen, and Wang did not become aware of that until the aftermath of the Westboro crash when the orange lines were pointed out by a colleague at the city, Wang said.
"We consider this a construction deficiency," he said, adding that contractors are not supposed to use black paint for such work.
Peter Napier, one of the lawyers leading the inquest, focused some of his questions on why the lines apparently did not come on the city's radar earlier.
"If anyone from the city had had a look at the construction project after the project was finished in November 2018, and before the collision, I'm going to suggest to you that it would have been readily apparent that those lines hadn't been blasted off but had been covered in black paint," Napier said to Wang.
The city objected to that question and Napier said he would rephrase it when Wang continued his testimony on Tuesday.
WATCH | Looking back on the crash and its lingering impacts:
On Tuesday, Napier asked Wang if it was standard for the city to verify the work of its construction contractors.
Wang said, in this case, that job was the responsibility of Parsons, a company retained by the city to provide inspection and management services.
The contractor did not properly remove the lines until June 2020, 17 months after the crash. Site access to the Transitway following the investigation into the crash was a factor in delays, the inquest has heard.
The inquest continues on Tuesday.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
