When asked about being awarded Life Member status by the national American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), Prof. Mo Ehsani responds jokingly “That just means that I’m really old!”

With age comes experience, and Prof. Ehsani has plenty of that. As well as the aforementioned Life Member status, which he describes as “a surprise”. He is also a Fellow of the American Concrete Institute (ACI), the Centennial Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering at the University of Arizona, a past director of the Arizona Chapter of ACI and he has served as President of the Structural Engineers Association of Arizona. He has received B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Michigan and his research findings have been published in numerous academic and industry publications, including those published by ACI, ASCE, the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) and more.

He has also been featured on CNN, National Public Radio, the History Channel, and in other media, including Engineering News Record (ENR) for his expertise on the strengthening of structures, particularly related to earthquakes, terrorist attacks and other potential structural disasters. 2019, the year Prof. Ehsani was awarded Life Member status by the ASCE, was also the year that the company he founded, QuakeWrap Inc., celebrated 25 years of infrastructure repair and renewal innovations.

“The sky is the limit” for the company according to Firat Sever, the manager of QuakeWrap’s Pipeline Division. “Where we are really growing are both in our Pipeline Division and in our Marine Division,” adds Prof. Ehsani, “because we have about twenty different patents in these areas so this is where we don’t have any competition and we really see great opportunity for growing the business”.

“Prof. Ehsani co-authored the first technical paper on using carbon fiber reinforced polymers for strengthening structures back in the 1980s.”

Incorporated in 1994, QuakeWrap has done pioneering work with Fiber Reinforced Polymer (FRP) and its applications for infrastructure repair and renewal innovations. “It was back in 1987 or so we had a crazy idea, one of my colleagues and I, to strengthen the infrastructure of buildings, bridges and pipelines and so on, and instead of using steel and concrete we would use carbon fiber” said Prof. Ehsani, “At that time it was a really crazy, novel idea so it took many years of testing and going to conferences and publications to convince the engineering community that this was ok”. He isn’t exaggerating about the novelty of the approach. In fact, Prof. Ehsani co-authored the first technical paper on using carbon fiber reinforced polymers for strengthening structures back in the 1980s.

It was the late 1990s before QuakeWrap really began to focus on working with, and reinforcing pipes. “We went to nuclear power plants where they have large diameter pipes as a part of their cooling systems. These are pipes that are anywhere from seven or eight feet to ten or twelve feet in diameter. And what happens with these pipes is that they usually have steel wires in them and over the years the wires start to corrode and the pipe becomes weak. So we were proposing that we could go inside these pipes and line them with carbon FRP”. Prof. Ehsani also came up with the idea of ‘Super Laminating’ pipes that were too small for maintenance workers to enter. The basic premise is that the FRP is placed around a “balloon-like device” called a Packer which is sent inside of smaller diameter pipes. Once the Packer has reached the point of the pipe that needs to be repaired or strengthened, the device can be inflated and the FRP will line the inside of that section of pipe. “It’s almost like a stent that they use in the medical field” he says.

QuakeWrap recently received a grant from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to further develop this technique to repair damaged water pipes without cutting trenches under roads and streets. They were also awarded a Phase II Small Business Innovation and Research (SBIR) grant ($1,000,000) by the US Department of Transportation (USDOT)/ Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) for development of an innovative oil and gas transmission pipeline repair system that can be installed without any excavation (no-dig). In addition to the potential to save lives and substantial amounts of money in pipeline integrity management, this new technology is also expected to reduce methane emissions from natural gas lines significantly by stopping and preventing leaks.

Environmental concerns often get a mention in Prof. Ehsani’s work. As well as avoiding environmental damage by super laminating pipes with FRP, QuakeWrap has also sought to improve environmental friendliness through its revolutionary StifPipe^® and InfinitPipe^® innovations. StifPipe^® consists of a custom-designed sandwich structure without the need of excessive layers of carbon fiber. It is a high-strength, lightweight, and corrosion resistant product ideal for water, wastewater, stormwater, oil, gas, and other fluid conveyance systems subject to internal and external loads. StifPipe^®’s strength to unit weight ratio is unmatched by any material used in the pipeline industry, according to Prof. Ehsani. It can be used for structural pipeline rehabilitation with trenchless technology (by the wet layup or sliplining method) or new pipe installation. Sliplining with StifPipe^® typically does not require any jacking equipment due to its light weight.

“StifPipe^®’s strength to unit weight ratio is unmatched by any material used in the pipeline industry.”

Another innovative technology by QuakeWrap is the InfinitPipe^® system, which enables making essentially joint-free pipeline on-site. Most pipes manufactured to date require extensive heavy equipment to handle, and manufacturing in a large plant. These larger pipe sections are typically made in 5-10 meter pieces and are shipped to the job site for assembly in the field. These logistics add significant transportation and installation costs. Worse, the joints on these pipes are the weakest links, where water, gas or oil can leak and cause environmental damage. For sewer pipes, these joints become a source of penetration of roots and require a constant maintenance expense. InfinitPipe^® overcomes all of these limitations. This innovative pipe takes advantage of long-recognized engineering principles of FRP, and uses these materials to make a pipeline on a mobile manufacturing unit (MMU) by producing approximately 10 ft of pipe every 30 minutes in the field, requiring no joints except for branch connections or bends greater than a certain limit depending on the pipe size and design. InfinitPipe^®’s flexibility is comparable to plastic pipes and can accommodate FRP and plastic fittings for such connections.

Using this technology to avoid environmentally disastrous leaks for pipes carrying everything from water to oil to sewage is sure to become more and more popular as environmentalism gains momentum. The Keystone XL pipeline’s developer halted all construction on the project in June after its permit was revoked by the Biden administration. Environmentalists and Native American groups had fought against the project for more than a decade due to fears that a leak could do untold damage to local ecosystems and tribal lands. Innovations like StifPipe^® and InfinitPipe^® could help ease environmental concerns and ensure smoother business dealings for all involved. “In a couple of years, I anticipate that we will start getting a good share of that pipe repair market in the oil and gas industry upon finishing this grant project from the US Government” says Firat.

Looking to the future, Prof. Ehsani and QuakeWrap are eager to expand their pool of talent going forward to build on the success of the past. “Every year for the past seven years we have been offering twice a year a contractor certification and training course”. Helping to train engineers and installers to work with their technology is sure to improve QuakeWrap’s hold on the market in the coming years.

Industry leaders within the construction world know how to get things done. In fact, given that buildings and structures have been around as long as we have as a species, it could be safe to assume that we have discovered everything that is worth knowing about construction and its manifold uses. For instance, recent archaeological developments show that concrete, while the exact dates are difficult to deduce, has been used for building purposes for somewhere between 9,000 and 12,000 years. During that time, advances have continuously been made in relation to tools, uses, design and procedures, enabling us to reach a point where cutting edge technology and scientific discovery is simply a part of what we do. However, given that this is an industry that is forever moving forward, striving to reach the next level of skill and service, it begs the question; where do we go next?

Augmented Reality is a piece of technology that has been spoken about for many years. From its inception, the potential for it to change the world we live in immeasurably has been both feared and anticipated in equal measure. It is a highly speculative area that few have been able to tap into effectively. The longer the world watches and waits to see how Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality (AR/VR) will be used, the louder the voices are dismissing it as a fad with no real benefit. However, given that the global spending on Augmented Reality for 2020 was somewhere in the region of $19B, an 80% increase on the previous year, perhaps it is time that the world, and the construction industry in particular, started taking notice. In fact, developments in the area are already becoming commonplace in some aspects of construction work.

The story of how Augmented Reality started to become a tool within the industry goes back a number of years. In April, 2017, vGIS Inc., a Canadian company specializing in collaboration software designed technology for the Tom’s River Municipal Utilities Authority (TRMUA) in New Jersey to quite literally see through the ground. TRMUA became the first municipality in the world to utilize this technology that, at the time, was still in its infancy. Using holographic GIS (Geographic Information Systems), vGIS Inc. used the Microsoft Hololens glasses as the platform for their vGIS software. This combination, along with the robust mapping work that the municipality had completed, allowed the wearer to see any subterranean utility lines. Incredibly, the workers on any public project had access to real-time in-field visuals of any water, electricity, drain or sewer lines and pipes without breaking stride.

Notwithstanding the time saving benefits of such technology, the ability to work in a safe and secure manner was revolutionary. At the time, Len Bundra, IT/GIS Director of Toms River MUA said, “The TRMUA has built a robust Geographic Information System (GIS) using ESRI’s ArcGIS Online Services. With our utility infrastructure and data now online, we can have real-time collaboration with our field crews. Field workers can now literally ‘see’ utility lines beneath their feet, when viewed through the Microsoft HoloLens. This takes GIS to a whole new dimension of dynamic mapping and data retrieval.”

“Current utility-locating equipment doesn’t take advantage of the wealth of data that already exists in municipal databases.”

Additionally, the creators of the software, vGIS Inc., believed that the venture was evidence of the positive effects of taking a collaborative approach, combining cutting edge technology with pre-existing information. On launching the project, Alec Pestov, CEO of vGIS Inc. said, “Current utility-locating equipment doesn’t take advantage of the wealth of data that already exists in municipal databases. Toms River MUA has a vision of how utility systems management should evolve, and we’re pleased to be their technology partner to bring their vision to life. Working together, vGIS Inc. and TRMUA have been able to create a completely new type of utilities-management platform by leveraging ESRI’s ArcGIS, Microsoft HoloLens and Microsoft Azure technologies.”

Since that ground-breaking foray into the industry, there has been steady progress and incremental improvements to the technology on offer. The insight that this project offered, primarily the opportunity to use existing maps and documents to give construction workers a fascinating advantage when navigating the job site, has grown to be a popular one. Virtual tours of existing spaces, allowing for remote understanding of the location, has been adopted throughout the industry. While alongside these advancements, architectural work has also begun reaping the benefits of these products; virtually touring buildings that are yet to be built being of huge benefit to a project. It seems that visualization, in each of these cases, is a key factor in the success of the products and tech. It is at this juncture, that VisualLive comes in.

VisualLive is a Tempe, AZ, company behind HoloLive, the first platform available to the AEC market that ‘’allows real-time 3D visualization, collaboration and field to office communication.’’ The company describes its product offering as ‘’off-the-shelf augmented reality software on Microsoft HoloLens, Android, and iOS for design, engineering, and construction companies.’’ What this means is that the company has designed an interface that is compatible with over 70 3D file formats, allowing the user to push large BIM/CAD files to a range of devices in one click. The opportunities that this software now offers is both astounding and thrilling. At every stage of the project, from planning and design through to verification and inspection, VisualLive’s technology can enhance the experience and create a fluid and intuitive experience for the worker. The data is cloud-based, ensuring that it can be accessed quickly in the field and, according to VisualLive themselves, the software ‘’quickly converts … files, keeping all geometries, textures, and materials, so that they are optimized while maintaining the critical information and data.’’

While the company is not the sole provider of this type of product, it is clear that the platform it has developed is proving to be incredibly successful throughout the construction industry. VisualLive now provides its services to over 1,500 commercial clients. From a macro perspective, it would seem that, since the pioneering use of this tech in Tom’s River Municipality, the scope and opportunity to provide tangible benefits has hugely increased. By enabling private companies to push designs and relevant data to devices in addition to utilizing multiple devices and platforms, the reach of this software is now far greater than it was.

“VisualLive now provides its services to over 1,500 commercial clients.”

Though the use of augmented reality is still most comfortable in the gaming and sales industries, it is becoming apparent that this technology is not something to be feared in construction. Reports suggest that the use of AR globally will again increase by a staggering 77% in the next two years. While these figures are speculative and may be subject to revision given the difficulties faced around the world, they provide hope nonetheless. Benefits to the construction industry, from training and planning through to real-time collaboration and on-site safety issues, show that the potential for a technological revolution is already here. While construction may well have been around for 12,000 years, it would seem that our learning journey is far from over.

Growth is a key aspect of any business. At a moment’s notice, costs can rise and local and global markets are always liable to fluctuations beyond their control. It is vital, therefore, that a business has the stability needed to weather any potential storm. As we have all realized in the past eighteen months, nothing can be taken for granted in any industry. The pandemic has impacted how every industry, including construction, operates. Companies need to protect themselves while simultaneously be able to adapt to change, exploit strengths and address ongoing challenges. Growth and success can come in many forms; for Sterling Ridge Group, it came through incremental acquisitions which paved the way for a more collaborative and cohesive vision for the future. While the timing of this period of growth and change has not been ideal, the group has risen to the challenge.

Sterling Ridge Group has a rich and varied history. It began life more than forty years ago with a series of acquisitions. The company founders built their reputation and knowledge through hard work, dedication and leadership. This led to a point where, according to Alawi Altahhan, Director of Project Management, Quality Assurance & Document Control with Sterling Ridge Group, ‘’They owned one of the biggest construction companies in Essex County.’’ Erie Sand and Gravel Limited began making acquisitions, building its reach across the construction industry until it held a massive portfolio that could provide a start to finish service for its clients, from design and planning, right through to project completion. Alawi explains that, while this growth was incremental, the end results were impressive. ‘’They bought a small company and then they bought another small company, one company to do trucking, other companies to do aggregates, general contracting, civil or infrastructure projects. While this growth has strategically been incremental, it has stimulated ongoing expansion and has allowed work to develop across multiple industries, providing associated services to clients.’’

While these interlinked companies allowed a complete knowledge and range of services available to clients, outwardly, they were independent of each other. The decision was made to pull these composite parts together and form a bespoke entity that could serve the total needs of its clients in-house. “A couple of years ago, we said, why can’t we rebrand all these different companies with different names? Why not put them under one name with multiple divisions? In less than a year, we rebranded all those small companies into one big company named Sterling Ridge Group.’’ This rebranding and rehousing now allows the Sterling Ridge Group to work across multiple industries, providing a multidisciplinary service to clients. It is not an exaggeration to say that, between the various divisions of the group, a project can be completed from start to finish without needing to find additional contractors. ‘’Right now, we give our clients a wide range of services. One of our main divisions is civil infrastructure, another one is power infrastructure and energy; wind turbines, solar panels, electric. Then we have general contracting, the ICI division, which is institutional commercial and industrial building. We work with Chrysler, Ford, the University of Windsor. All these big names and we give them an A to Z experience.’’

This reorganizing and tying of various divisions together occurred just in time to take advantage of various large scale projects, namely the high profile Gordie Howe International Bridge. Sterling Ridge Group was awarded the Surcharge Project at the Canadian Point of Entry. This was the first large scale project performed by multiple divisions and allowed the group to showcase its myriad of in-house talents. According to Alawi, ‘’by coordinating the supply of aggregate, trucking and infrastructure work, the group achieved numerous milestones well ahead of schedule.’’

“It is not an exaggeration to say that, between the various divisions of the group, a project can be completed from start to finish without needed to find additional contractors.”

While the benefits of combining the group are obvious, such a move also presents logistical considerations. Running alongside the services these divisions provide are potential clashes of culture, differing values and company ethos. Alawi acknowledges that this was an aspect of the amalgamation that needed to be addressed. However, he feels that the company got things right in this regard. ‘’Those companies used to have small shops or headquarters in different locations. So, one of the first things we did was put all of those people under one roof. We renovated and redesigned our building, then our people started working with each other. Then we modified our administration work and document control. We put a department for document control in and now, we all follow the same procedures, the same document control, the same letterhead.’’ Any minor resistance to change that did surface was dealt with through directed mentoring and support for all staff members. This is a long term approach and Alawi speaks of the steady and cautious approach the company took to guide its staff through any initial turbulence. ‘’We take them step by step and we show them what we need. They work on changes. Now when they master these changes, they oversee others and they help them to adapt too. Even today, day by day, step by step, we are moving forward. We are still in the process.’’

Such a large scale rebranding and reorganization exercise can be distracting. The challenge of staying on track, maintaining focus and continuing the high levels of service that clients had become accustomed to during a period of change is enormous. Alawi believes that, rather than slipping from a position of industry leader, the Sterling Ridge Group is even better placed to achieve its growth targets. Identifying two markets that the group seeks to solidify and expand into. ‘’Our target right now is to be the number one company, providing the largest variety of construction services in South Ontario. Whatever you need, you can come to the same company, all the time. Now in addition to that, we are trying to target expansion within the GTA area.’’ These targets will require the continued excellence that the group has provided until now. One aspect of this continued success and growth that is vital is the staff. Alawi is quick to point out that the group feels that the skilled staff it has on board is both the reason for its current strength and also the key to any future development. ‘’We have been adding a lot of talented people to our group in the last three years. Those people played a big part of the changes that we have made and they will continue this into the future. These workers are both the core and the future of the company.’’

While it is clear that the pandemic has affected industries around the globe, construction being no different, the Sterling Ridge Group have tried to use the lessons it has learned to its advantage. By putting ‘’very comprehensive protocols in place’’ almost immediately, the company has been able to run its operations as smoothly as ever. ‘’We provide all the measures that they need to keep to maintain standards in house, on the site and in the office. We provide all the IT support. So for people working from home, they have access to the server, access to the drawings, access to space, work, communicate. So as of now, we have already adapted, we know what we are doing. It’s adding to the cost of running the project or running the company, but overall, it’s not a struggle anymore.’’ While the additional burden of pandemic related protocols may have been too much for another company, Sterling Ridge Group used these challenges as leverage to show what they could do as a collective force. Alawi sees the experience as a huge benefit to the group. ‘’We worked collectively to address issues, provide the necessary tools to our workforce and ensured worker safety and project completion. In those most difficult times, the strength, experience, dedication and loyalty of all of our people working together in a safe way helped us to weather the storm but also to achieve and succeed.’’

“By adapting to an online global industry, the group now uses an interconnected world to cast the net wider than it may have done in the past.”

This remote way of working has provided an opportunity to turn current restrictions into advantages. The ever present challenge of attracting the best quality staff is one that the Sterling Ridge Group is not immune from. By adapting to an online global industry, the group now uses an interconnected world to cast the net wider than it may have done in the past. ‘’The world is very small. It’s not like back in the day. Now you can bring people from anywhere in the world to work in your area. So when we hire people, for example, we go to our LinkedIn page. And we post there, and we start talking to people. There are certain types of questions that we ask to see the ability of the person, are they open minded, can they think outside the box. At the end of the day, if we find the most talented person for this position, and they are asking for a little bit more than the person in Windsor. We don’t mind bringing them over.’’

The Sterling Ridge Group has, in some shape or form, been a growing business for almost forty years. The company has developed through expansion, experience, knowledge and outside acquisitions. This growth and these changes are testament to a key driving force within the group. It would seem that the reputation of the work and the workers continues to provide assurance to the people of Ontario and further afield is every bit as important as the company logo. Regardless of the name and office location, this divisions within this group all have a commitment to work of the highest quality with the customer’s needs a priority. Alawi is considered and confident when discussing the reason why so many clients of the group continue to seek out their services. ‘’At the end of the day, the people that ran those companies are the same people. They are well known in South Ontario to the subcontractors, to the suppliers and to the manufacturers. The individuals who used to run the company and the senior management, they are well known within the industry here and have been for a long time. Our customers already have a great relationship with us and they are happy to continuing working together.’’

Northern Ontario is awash in both natural beauty and resources. Little surprise that an array of industries have emerged in the region over the decades. From forestry and mining all the way to local infrastructure and utility service projects, it is an area of constant growth and change as cycles of industry rise and fall. Located just above the US border on the St. Mary’s River, the city of Sault Ste. Marie finds itself at the nexus of those turbulent enterprises.

By their very nature, strategies and long-term plans are subject to constant monitoring but what is required in order to achieve success when a company is subject to the whims of boom-and-bust industrial cycles? It certainly pays to be nimble, maintaining an ability to pivot wherever needed. More importantly, however, is the desire to increasingly expand institutional spheres of knowledge and expertise in order to maximize the support available to clients, whatever their needs may be.

The S&T Group has called Sault Ste. Marie home for 37 years now, though it has also branched out to include the Upper Peninsula across the border in Michigan. Starting out as a small electrical outfit, it consolidated its early growth by venturing into the technology sector; working with established giants such as IBM and Royal Bank of Canada. Never happy to rest on its laurels, S&T continued to increase its offerings across the skilled-trade spectrum. As a result, over the years they’ve evolved into a full-service construction business, echoing the growth of the province’s myriad commercial concerns. S&T’s Vice President of Business Development Jim Tait, said “I think S&T has grown organically over the years. We are now agile enough and we have enough in-house skill to transfer from one market to the next. By that, I mean that we can support our local steel company when they’re busy and we are also able to supply everything from construction services to resources from a manpower perspective. We’re a multi-trade construction services business. Currently, we have everything from plumbers, to sheet metal skilled trades, to HVAC technicians and of course, we do everything in between.”

When the Covid-19 pandemic struck early last year, it was only this breadth of service expertise that allowed S&T Group to steer as necessary and navigate a devastating year for business across every industry. As vast swathes of the economy were effectively shut down, S&T Group, like so many others, found itself wondering what the next steps were to ensure the company’s survival, and thus the jobs of its thirty permanent office staff and seventy-plus skilled tradespeople. As the realities of regional lockdown became apparent, opportunities to help support local infrastructure projects proved to be a win-win for both S&T and the community. As Jim notes, “I think our agility, and our flexibility, as well as our scalability is what allowed us to keep moving. There are infrastructure projects that were started before the pandemic that became a reality. Based on their importance, from a reliability perspective to the general public, these projects needed to keep moving. So, we did work on some water utility and some electrical utility and we will continue with those projects going forward.”

“I think our agility, and our flexibility, as well as our scalability is what allowed us to keep moving.”

As 2021 hopefully pushes everyone closer towards business as usual, the indications are that the construction industry will experience a resurgence, with much work to be done. Algoma Steel Inc, Sault Ste. Marie’s largest employer, is in the process of implementing a new liquid metal furnace that S&T has been working on extensively. According to Jim, “Because of our high level of quality and delivery there, they’ve been asking us to continue to do other projects outside of that infrastructure base.” This is what Jim sees as the next stage of S&T’s evolution, a continued adaptation to becoming an all-in-one, holistic construction services operation. With the multi-disciplinary organic growth of the company over the years it seemed both a natural and progressive step forward. Communicating this approach to customers and business partners has been one of the challenges of the past few years. “Our goal is to try to get customers to work with us from the inception or the concept of a project and allow us to help them determine scope, budget, and work with us independently. Through that process, a transparent open-book philosophy is what we’ve been trying to promote.”

Gold mining is on an upward trajectory in Northern Ontario and, similar to their work with the local steel plant, S&T Group is offering its full suite of support services to the burgeoning industry. Their ambitions, however, aren’t limited to the region’s traditional heavy industries. Demonstrating a commitment to a progressive pursuit of expertise, you can also find their fingerprints across many other emerging fields. S&T Group’s diverse range of skills and experience has allowed it to work with the energy company Convergent in the cutting-edge field of battery-storage technology. These new relationships are ensuring that the company’s high quality work can be seen throughout the province.

S&T’s idea of progressive growth isn’t limited to their service offerings, either. Since 2018, they’ve been in partnership with the Missanabie Cree Business Corporation. Working with the Missanabie Cree First Nation has been another step towards cementing its relationships with the community and respecting the stakeholders they share the territory with. They’ve had particular success thus far in their joint ventures in the mining sector. Jim says, “We work together, we talk on a regular basis and approach jobs together. With their help, we have formed a pretty great partnership. These efforts go towards supporting impacted First Nation communities by providing opportunities which ultimately lead to long-term capacity building. I think it’s a pretty satisfying and progressive type of relationship.” In contrast to the population dense southern half of the province, industry in Northern Ontario tends to follow the fickle fluctuation of natural resource markets, making it difficult to pin any one particular flag to the mast. Gold mining is on the rise, but will that be the case in a decade? The steel and forestry industries have both experienced disorienting peaks and valleys over the last fifty years. While Jim accepts that this is part of life in the region, he believes that this is something that the company needs to be wary of. “You know, when you live in the larger communities, you’re able to kind of focus in on a core of what you want to do and you can become an expert at that. There is typically enough work to enable you to stick with a core skill set and be sustainable for the long term. In Northern Ontario, it’s not necessarily like that. Industries come and go and they really boom at one point of time, and then they go away and other industries boom at another time.”  On top of these industry-specific vagaries there are the usual cyclical economic recessions to cope with. While destabilizing black swan events do occur, as the current global pandemic has cruelly demonstrated, time and again, the willingness to transcend its previous incarnation has provided the platform for S&T Group’s success. Jim said, “I believe everyone in Sault Ste. Marie would know who S&T is and what we do. We are obviously province wide as well. We have gotten to that level because of our ability to grow and scale and be flexible when needed.” In a land where the full splendor of nature’s diversity is everywhere you look, it obviously pays to heed her example. Adapt. Evolve. Thrive.

To say yes is to make things move. To this end, Clearway deploys a comprehensive array of infrastructure solutions across sectors and models to get communities connected: wet utilities, shoring, vertical trenching, energy pipelines, electrical distribution, telecommunications, transportation, fleet management, treatment plants, soil remediation, stormwater and floodplain management. “We really have a hard time saying no,” says Mark Meyer, Vice-President of the Ontario-based company. “We never turned anything down. We really don’t. We have a lot of confidence in our abilities and we consider ourselves very good at managing risk.”

“We look for the most difficult projects from a constructability, but also from a contractual standpoint,” he explains, going on to describe the company’s approach to “difficult”, which involves breaking it down into various categories. Primarily operating as an underground contractor, early undertakings in the Toronto region meant navigating challenging local ground conditions, which led to honing a specific set of skills in that area of expertise. While there is obvious satisfaction to be derived from successfully executing projects with tricky technical issues, the Clearway team also takes pride in demonstrating the ability to perform at the exacting levels required by high pressure environments, such as when it renewed the infrastructure of the Darlington nuclear facility, which entailed myriad protocols of all kinds.

“The confidence that we have to tackle these types of projects has really been ingrained in the company by the founders,” says Meyer of the company culture, which evolved from the inspiring trajectory of the Di Battista brothers, who essentially manifested the emigrant’s dream come true, through a combination of self assurance, solid work and forward thinking. The four young men departed Italy for Canada together in the early 1970s, seeking opportunity and adventure, like so many others before and after them. Only one member of the family had any previous experience in the construction industry. Yet within less than three years of arrival in their new homeland, they had transitioned from beginner jobs with a small local company to establishing their own business.

Meyer credits Nick Di Battista especially, current CEO, for setting the tone and direction for the journey to come. When Di Battista was recently asked from what moment in the early days he felt secure enough about the fledgling enterprise to sleep soundly at night, he replied serenely: “From day one. There was never a doubt in my mind that we were going to be able to start a business and be successful at it.” For Meyer, this sense of calm self-assurance is characteristic of the company’s progression over almost 50 years in the industry, “organically grown” as he describes the overall growth strategy to date. Shifting gears for the next decades, leadership wants to make sure it is well positioned to capitalize on the rapidly expanding market in Ontario, which means exploring more strategic acquisitions and partnerships, as well as some outsourcing. Through recognizing the importance of strategic growth, the company investment in programs for the development of people will also be key. The target is ambitious: to double in size within 10 years. While it may be an ambitious target, current President of Clearway, Anthony DiBattista, continues to embrace strategic growth as a means of achieving these goals. Clearly, this growth and development, while evidenced by the companies longevity and continued success, can also be found on a leadership level.

“We never turn anything down. We really don’t. We have a lot of confidence in our abilities and we consider ourselves very good at managing risk.”

Things are moving and will continue to do so. Clearway recently took on a pivotal part in the construction of the largest transit expansion in the history of Toronto. The new Eglinton Crosstown Light Rail Transit, due for completion in 2022, spans 25 stops and 19 kilometers from east to west across the city, with a significant portion of the line running underground. Clearway was responsible for the majority of the wet utilities throughout the project, including relocations, as well as concrete and roadworks, traction, duct bank work for the light rail itself, and almost all the miscellaneous civil components in between. The team also participated in constructability review and permit obtainment processes. Despite some setbacks, construction continued throughout the pandemic period, as it was deemed essential work in Ontario. Mindful of the overall situation and particularly within the municipal context, Meyer felt it was important to proactively lead by example, to reassure the wider community about the safety and benefits of keeping the work ongoing.

“We wanted to prove to the regulators and to the authorities, that we could work safely, that we could adjust our techniques and adjust our workforce, so that we could continue to be an essential service, and not pose a risk to the public or to our employees. We took that very seriously, and that was from all standpoints,” he says. “We invited our clients to our job sites to see the protocols that we had put in place, we collaborated with the local unions, and with the Ministry of Labor and Public Health as well, to make sure that the things that we were putting in place were appropriate, and were going to help us protect our people.”

For those not employed in the work itself, active construction projects are often viewed as sources of dust, noise and disruption. With this in mind, Meyer is keen to emphasise the value of good conduct on every site, with the hope of leaving a positive impression on the various communities that Clearway comes into contact with. Taking the commitment to community further, President Anthony Di Batista oversees company support for local charity and social initiatives, as a way to give something back to the area. He is very actively involved with Caritas, a community-led initiative to assist individuals struggling with addiction and associated mental health problems. Its stated values are based on a holistic approach to people and to life, and while based in Toronto, it maintains strong affiliations and regular exchanges with similar communities in the Di Batista’s motherland, Italy.

“From day one. There was never a doubt in my mind that we weren’t going to be able to start a business and be successful at it.”

Alongside a duty of kindness for people, there is a parallel responsibility of care for the environment. On the subject of sustainability, Meyer brings it back to the company culture and what he calls “the business of doing things right”. Clearway is open to investing in research and development on many aspects of its work, particularly where there could be a double-sided opportunity to do something that could simultaneously increase sustainability and provide a return. As he explains, sustainable options are now mandated by law, forward thinking, the future of the market. Furthermore: “It’s really hard to argue with the fact that if there’s a sustainable option to any aspect of our work, the right thing to do is to look at it.”

While much of the legacy projects done by companies such as Clearway will remain underground for the duration of their functional lives, it is clearly still important that they are developed and constructed with integrity. “I think it means everything,” says Meyer when asked for his opinion on this. “You know, if we’re operating as a construction company, truly to our ethics, to our morals, and we’re really out to do better for the public, for the people that work for us, and just for the community in general, that’s something that I don’t think is lost on people, right?”