Project Delivery, Modernization and More with Stantec's Abakumov

With a passion for creating great communities that influence social interaction, Dena Abakumov serves as principal, transit & rail sector lead, for Stantec.

While working on some of the largest transit projects in Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, and Chicago, she has strengthened her expertise in the sector while managing and working with large teams across Canada and the U.S.

Most recently, Abakumov relocated to Chicago as one of the key segment leads on the CTA Red and Purple Modernization Project.

METRO’s Executive Editor Alex Roman got a chance to speak with Abakumov about capital project delivery, the differences between projects in the U.S. and Canada, and much more.

Both the Canadian and American governments have made historic investments in transit, how are those investments paying off so far?

In terms of the funding that's been happening, we've been seeing a lot of growth across the sector between both Canada and the U.S. Initially, as funding announcements have come through, it has taken a bit more time to see some of the projects get released to market, but now it's been a busy year to track all of the different opportunities.

We’re seeing some of the major projects we have, such as Metrolinx, are getting extended, which is great for our teams.

In Canada, we are seeing a lot of the investment in the key transit hubs throughout Canada. there are also big investments happening in Alberta. Calgary has a large investment through the Route Ahead Transit Plan.

Additional big investments have also been made in Vancouver, and our teams are situated and working on some of these key projects. Most recently, I would say the biggest project Stantec is working on is the UBC extension, which we won last year and is well into kickoff.

In the U.S., funding is a little bit of a different process in that it has to go through the FRA and FTA. There are tons of different programs, and in general because of the scale of what we are seeing in the U.S., some agencies, especially the small- to mid-sized agencies, are still trying to work out how they can capitalize on those opportunities before the elections to leverage the investments being made at the federal level. There is a lot of money still on the table for these different programs.

Even though ridership is down post-COVID, we are starting to see some interesting projects that are coming up with investment in newer rail extensions. We’ve started to see some of that happening with the broader programs that Amtrak is looking at for passenger rail across the country. One heavy focus is safety with the rail crossing elimination program, which is tying in well with some of the DOT programs we have across the country.

There is also a lot of activity in some of the key hubs, including in California with the high-speed rail program, where our team is leading the design for the Merced to Madera junction. In New York, the MTA has announced station upgrades and new LRT extension.

Right now, the market is busy, and many agencies are still trying to figure out how they can get a lot of different projects out on the street for the consultant market to continue to pursue. We are in this stage of identifying how we can prioritize projects based on opportunity to provide service and impact to the communities from an equity perspective. Every agency is trying to make those dollars go further from an equity perspective to enhance the various communities that they serve, so it's an exciting time to be in the transit and rail industry.

You mentioned new rail programs even though ridership is down. Are these programs trying to attract new riders, serve ridership better in areas that are busier, or some of both?

Well, it’s some of both. When we look at new ridership, I think a good example is Philadelphia where they are looking at rebranding their transit system to be ‘mobility for all,’ which is very important which is critical for new ridership. In the U.S., there is a bit of a stigma toward transit compared to what I’ve seen in Canada. In Canada, transit is trendy, so it’s kind of hip to not only support but also use public transit. In the U.S., that framework isn’t as established yet.

In Canada, one interesting strategy has been to use BRT to help build ridership before making a significant investment in rail. Some agencies have taken that farther in their BRT projects by accounting for rail during design development on key pieces of infrastructure with higher service life like bridges to ensure they can accommodate BRT, but also the potential for future rail.

In the U.S., though, there are some agencies that have been able to shift their focus from providing rail service during the peak morning and evening commute hours to adding more midday service to capitalize on ridership trends they have been experiencing because things have changed post-COVID. We’ve seen that in Chicago with commuter rail service by Metra and numerous other cities. So there’s definitely been some successes in the way U.S. transit agencies have tried to shift where service is being provided to be able to attract more of that flexibility.

The key to transit, though, is reliability. It’s hard to compete with somebody’s typical drive time in their personal automobile. To be competitive, transit has to rely on reliability and convenience. So, many agencies right now are focused on the state of good repair projects to keep their systems running to make sure they can continue to provide that reliable service.

With larger cities, like Chicago and New York, taking on such large projects, what are some of the key factors in those projects continuing to progress, and ultimately, reach completion on time?

The key element to that from an agency perspective is making sure they have their funding in place —that’s step number one. Costs have been escalating across all of the different projects, so trying to make sure agencies are able to stay ahead of that and engaging the right type of team members to help flag as early as possible and understand where cost escalations may come in is important. If cost escalations come up, they need to figure out if they can leverage additional funding and work with partners to look at a shared cost element to help cover some of those additional increases that we are seeing.

Across the board, our team has been seeing how these escalations have impacted different projects. An interesting position for us to be in is to see how different projects, especially the really large ones, have been able to identify these long lead items and supply chain issues and then try and navigate and mitigate that within the schedule and budget. It really comes down to early identification — working with the consultant team to help make sure that you’ve got a solid risk process to make sure that your agency is able to mitigate those risks early on in the process, and then subsequently, work with their funding partners to make sure they can offset some of those rising costs.

The other thing is from a design perspective, our projects have put a key focus on integration. On these transit projects, the bread and butter or the glue to keep the projects moving is making sure we have a solid understanding of how all of these elements are integrated. Having a team that has experience on projects of different scales and magnitudes to make sure that all cross-discipline interfaces are identified to make sure they are well vetted.

The use of 3D tools is important as well to make sure all of those interfaces are identified. In general, we’ve shifted a lot of our design to be focused on 3D, which gives everybody, including the owner and the agencies, a clearer understanding of where the scope challenges may be on a project.

As far as cost escalations, is that something that's just standard or does it vary from project to project?

It varies from project to project, depending on the requirements, equipment, and elements that are in place.

In general, some projects have started to bring different delivery methods into play, at least on some of the larger projects. What’s new for the transit space is the progressive design-build. As we start to navigate a new process of delivery where we’re going from a traditional design-bid-build and trying to shift into a more collaborative model of progressive design-build, it’s helping to give agencies better cost certainty as they are able to develop costs when the design is actually developed versus pinning down a cost early on before designs have been developed and fully vetted as it is in a design-build model.

In terms of timing, it will be interesting to see how different agencies are navigating the process because some agencies feel that it’s taking too long to do that, or that it’s just added an extra timeframe. But I think it’s adding extra scope and cost certainty to help avoid later escalations and hopefully reduce claims and give everybody at the table better cost certainty, in terms of what the end pricing of the project will be.

It's been an ongoing issue that agencies in the U.S. have been slow taking up ‘alternative’ forms of project delivery. Are those types of project delivery starting to take hold a bit more here now with all of the circumstances that are currently in effect?

We are seeing a lot more alternative forms of project delivery; definitely. There are a lot of conversations happening with professional associations, like APTA, in terms of looking at major program capital delivery and how these different alternative delivery methods can happen.

The one that has started to emerge in Canada is the alliance delivery model, and we have worked on a few projects using this method. The alliance model is another iteration of that pain and gain share between all parties equally. That is a form of project delivery a few agencies such as Amtrak have started to ask about by issuing RFIs to the industry so they can better understand what it is all about.

I don’t think we are going to see this form of delivery take hold just yet, because there’s a certain perspective within the U.S. where agencies have made a big shift to go from traditional models to design-build and they just aren’t comfortable yet to go further into that with something like the alliance model. Progressive design-build, CMGC, and CMAR are becoming more common in the U.S., while Canada is starting to make progress a bit quicker on using alliance delivery models for large programs.

The difference between the U.S. and Canada is the systems in Canada are much younger, so there is generally more openness to innovation. When you have aging infrastructure  like they do in many major cities the U.S., you sometimes have to continue to do things the way they have been done because there are constraints on innovation, which makes alternative delivery models more difficult. When we have seen design-build methods in the U.S. with some of the larger, more mature agencies, some of those elements where innovation can be allowed get a bit constrained just based on how old the system is. You can’t get too modern with some of these systems.

For example, the new trains being purchased have to still be compatible with the oldest trains that are still running on a system. So, it's an interesting task to try and navigate.