The design and construction of the Trillium Line expansion will fall under a “peer review” in the same year it’s scheduled to open to transit customers.

Michael Morgan, the director of rail construction, sent a memo to Ottawa city council on Thursday outlining the technical differences between the electrified Confederation Line and the diesel train Trillium Line. In the memo, Morgan announced that the city would hire a rail construction firm or agency to undertake a review “to assess further opportunities for improvement.”

“This process is expected to take three to four months to complete and will be completed with sufficient time to influence the final outcomes of the project,” Morgan wrote in the memo, which didn’t provide a cost estimate for the review.

Coun. Carol Anne Meehan, in a motion seconded by Coun. Diane Deans, asked for the peer review during a council meeting in October. The majority of council voted instead to delay the motion until December, giving staff time to assess the idea.

City council members are scheduled to receive a presentation on the $4.6-billion Stage 2 project on Friday, including an update on construction schedules for the three-part expansion. Staff said last winter that the Trillium Line could be delayed, but they asked for time to confirm the schedule after a full construction season.

The Trillium Line, which is being constructed by SNC-Lavalin under the project name TransitNEXT, is supposed to be substantially complete in August 2022.

The city also announced there would be overnight work on the Trillium Line project between Bayview Station and Carling Avenue through the winter and spring “to maximize the winter construction season and accelerate timelines where possible.”

Meehan said she pushed the idea for a peer review because she wanted a full engineering inspection of the work.

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