The removal of materials from the demolition of the former Eaton’s store continued this week with steel and other metals and clean concrete being sorted for salvage and recycling. The remaining rubble is hauled to landfill. The entire process of clearing the site for the construction of the MTS Centre is now ninety percent complete.
In some areas, the site has been swept clean down to the former concrete basement floor level. More than two hundred forty loads of salvaged material and rubble (each load weighing approximately fifteen tons) were removed between Monday and Friday of this week. The activity will continue at the site on Saturday and Sunday as the demolition contractor continues the push toward completely clearing the area by mid-February.
The first major work in the eighteen month building project will be completion of the shoring of the streets and excavation a further six feet below the old basement level. This will be the elevation of the new event floor and ice surface for True North. Subterranean Limited of Winnipeg plan to start excavation and shoring at the Donald Street and Graham Avenue corner of the site on Monday, February 3rd.
PCL Constructors Canada Inc., the project construction managers, offered to donate their time and effort to assist Habitat For Humanity in collecting one thousand red bricks from the site. The brick is soft and the majority of the bricks cracked and crumbled as the building was demolished in the sub-zero weather. It has been more difficult than expected for Habitat to sort and collect the brick for sale. With the assistance of PCL, the bricks will be delivered to Habitat by the end of next week. The well-recognized and much-in-demand mementos will then be cleaned and displayed at the Habitat Re-Store, 75 Archibald Street in St. Boniface to members of the public seeking a souvenir of the former Eaton’s building.
[MTS Centre Construction Demolition Archive]
