Hamiltonians will get their first look at how the Red Hill Valley Inquiry process will unfold starting this week.
The inquiry — overseen by Commissioner Justice Herman Wilton-Siegel — will hold a public meeting Jan. 9. The meeting will start at 7 p.m. in the city’s council chambers.
On Jan. 10 at 10 a.m., Wilton-Siegel will hear nine presentations from various stakeholders.
The public meeting will allow residents to ask questions about the schedule, procedures and how they can participate in what is expected to be a long and costly process.
The participants who have been granted approval to speak to the inquiry include the City of Hamilton, the province, Dufferin Construction, Golder Associates (which commissioned the Tradewind Scientific report as part of its duties to evaluate the parkway in 2013), and people who were involved or had relatives involved in crashes on the parkway, including Jody Gawrylash, Belinda Marazzato — whose daughter Olivia Smosarski died in a collision on the parkway — and the law firms Grosso Hooper Law and Scarfone Hawkins.
The inquiry has set up a website for the public to follow the process at www.rhvpi.ca.
The judicial inquiry, which was approved by council last year, will investigate how a 2013 consultant’s report — which revealed friction issues with the parkway — wasn't presented to councillors for over five years.
The inquiry is required to answer a number of questions according to its terms of reference, including whether the provincial Transportation Ministry conducted any further tests on the highway after its 2007 friction test, why the report wasn’t discovered until 2018 and whether appropriate steps were taken to disclose the report. Other considerations the inquiry could follow include whether the city was negligent in failing to disclose the report, whether roadway users were put at risk as a result of the city’s failure to disclose the report, and whether the missing report contributed to accidents, injuries or fatalities on the Red Hill Parkway since January 2014.
The commissioner has the ability to revise the inquiry’s terms of reference, which were approved by council.
It is estimated the inquiry could take about a year, but inquiries can last longer than expected depending upon the issues the inquiry follows.
Council revealed in February 2019 that the 18-page Tradewind Scientific report showed friction on sections of the Red Hill Parkway was below United Kingdom safety standards. The results showed that the Red Hill Parkway had an overall lower friction than the Lincoln Alexander Expressway, with some portions of the roadway exhibiting “quite low friction values” and in some cases “well below” acceptable friction values. The report was locked away in a computer folder accessible to the city’s director of engineering services, where it stayed for years. It was only discovered when a new director was appointed to the position in September 2018.
In an unprecedented move the city and council apologized to the public after the report was revealed. The city has set aside $7 million for the judicial inquiry. The inquiry has already cost about $640,000, with most of the bill for legal fees.
In response to the revelations of the report, the city completed resurfacing work on both north and south sections of the parkway, reduced the speed limit from 90 km/h to 80 km/h, and installed new signage.
There has also been a $250-million class action lawsuit filed by Gross Hooper and Scarfone Hawkins against the City of Hamilton, contending the design and construction of the parkway was “done negligently and without using acceptable construction standards.”
The lawsuit states that over 2,000 vehicles have lost control on the road in the past 12 years, resulting in either single or multiple-vehicle crashes.
Hamiltonians will get their first look at how the Red Hill Valley Inquiry process will unfold starting this week.
The inquiry — overseen by Commissioner Justice Herman Wilton-Siegel — will hold a public meeting Jan. 9. The meeting will start at 7 p.m. in the city’s council chambers.
On Jan. 10 at 10 a.m., Wilton-Siegel will hear nine presentations from various stakeholders.
The public meeting will allow residents to ask questions about the schedule, procedures and how they can participate in what is expected to be a long and costly process.
The participants who have been granted approval to speak to the inquiry include the City of Hamilton, the province, Dufferin Construction, Golder Associates (which commissioned the Tradewind Scientific report as part of its duties to evaluate the parkway in 2013), and people who were involved or had relatives involved in crashes on the parkway, including Jody Gawrylash, Belinda Marazzato — whose daughter Olivia Smosarski died in a collision on the parkway — and the law firms Grosso Hooper Law and Scarfone Hawkins.
The inquiry has set up a website for the public to follow the process at www.rhvpi.ca.
The judicial inquiry, which was approved by council last year, will investigate how a 2013 consultant’s report — which revealed friction issues with the parkway — wasn't presented to councillors for over five years.
The inquiry is required to answer a number of questions according to its terms of reference, including whether the provincial Transportation Ministry conducted any further tests on the highway after its 2007 friction test, why the report wasn’t discovered until 2018 and whether appropriate steps were taken to disclose the report. Other considerations the inquiry could follow include whether the city was negligent in failing to disclose the report, whether roadway users were put at risk as a result of the city’s failure to disclose the report, and whether the missing report contributed to accidents, injuries or fatalities on the Red Hill Parkway since January 2014.
The commissioner has the ability to revise the inquiry’s terms of reference, which were approved by council.
It is estimated the inquiry could take about a year, but inquiries can last longer than expected depending upon the issues the inquiry follows.
Council revealed in February 2019 that the 18-page Tradewind Scientific report showed friction on sections of the Red Hill Parkway was below United Kingdom safety standards. The results showed that the Red Hill Parkway had an overall lower friction than the Lincoln Alexander Expressway, with some portions of the roadway exhibiting “quite low friction values” and in some cases “well below” acceptable friction values. The report was locked away in a computer folder accessible to the city’s director of engineering services, where it stayed for years. It was only discovered when a new director was appointed to the position in September 2018.
In an unprecedented move the city and council apologized to the public after the report was revealed. The city has set aside $7 million for the judicial inquiry. The inquiry has already cost about $640,000, with most of the bill for legal fees.
In response to the revelations of the report, the city completed resurfacing work on both north and south sections of the parkway, reduced the speed limit from 90 km/h to 80 km/h, and installed new signage.
There has also been a $250-million class action lawsuit filed by Gross Hooper and Scarfone Hawkins against the City of Hamilton, contending the design and construction of the parkway was “done negligently and without using acceptable construction standards.”
The lawsuit states that over 2,000 vehicles have lost control on the road in the past 12 years, resulting in either single or multiple-vehicle crashes.
Hamiltonians will get their first look at how the Red Hill Valley Inquiry process will unfold starting this week.
The inquiry — overseen by Commissioner Justice Herman Wilton-Siegel — will hold a public meeting Jan. 9. The meeting will start at 7 p.m. in the city’s council chambers.
On Jan. 10 at 10 a.m., Wilton-Siegel will hear nine presentations from various stakeholders.
The public meeting will allow residents to ask questions about the schedule, procedures and how they can participate in what is expected to be a long and costly process.
The participants who have been granted approval to speak to the inquiry include the City of Hamilton, the province, Dufferin Construction, Golder Associates (which commissioned the Tradewind Scientific report as part of its duties to evaluate the parkway in 2013), and people who were involved or had relatives involved in crashes on the parkway, including Jody Gawrylash, Belinda Marazzato — whose daughter Olivia Smosarski died in a collision on the parkway — and the law firms Grosso Hooper Law and Scarfone Hawkins.
The inquiry has set up a website for the public to follow the process at www.rhvpi.ca.
The judicial inquiry, which was approved by council last year, will investigate how a 2013 consultant’s report — which revealed friction issues with the parkway — wasn't presented to councillors for over five years.
The inquiry is required to answer a number of questions according to its terms of reference, including whether the provincial Transportation Ministry conducted any further tests on the highway after its 2007 friction test, why the report wasn’t discovered until 2018 and whether appropriate steps were taken to disclose the report. Other considerations the inquiry could follow include whether the city was negligent in failing to disclose the report, whether roadway users were put at risk as a result of the city’s failure to disclose the report, and whether the missing report contributed to accidents, injuries or fatalities on the Red Hill Parkway since January 2014.
The commissioner has the ability to revise the inquiry’s terms of reference, which were approved by council.
It is estimated the inquiry could take about a year, but inquiries can last longer than expected depending upon the issues the inquiry follows.
Council revealed in February 2019 that the 18-page Tradewind Scientific report showed friction on sections of the Red Hill Parkway was below United Kingdom safety standards. The results showed that the Red Hill Parkway had an overall lower friction than the Lincoln Alexander Expressway, with some portions of the roadway exhibiting “quite low friction values” and in some cases “well below” acceptable friction values. The report was locked away in a computer folder accessible to the city’s director of engineering services, where it stayed for years. It was only discovered when a new director was appointed to the position in September 2018.
In an unprecedented move the city and council apologized to the public after the report was revealed. The city has set aside $7 million for the judicial inquiry. The inquiry has already cost about $640,000, with most of the bill for legal fees.
In response to the revelations of the report, the city completed resurfacing work on both north and south sections of the parkway, reduced the speed limit from 90 km/h to 80 km/h, and installed new signage.
There has also been a $250-million class action lawsuit filed by Gross Hooper and Scarfone Hawkins against the City of Hamilton, contending the design and construction of the parkway was “done negligently and without using acceptable construction standards.”
The lawsuit states that over 2,000 vehicles have lost control on the road in the past 12 years, resulting in either single or multiple-vehicle crashes.