Contractors demand tenders for Carillion’s work in Alberta, Canada

Road contractors in the Canadian province of Alberta are demanding tenders be conducted for maintenance contracts that are currently run by Carillion, now in receivership. Carillion, based in the UK, went into receivership in January, and its Canadian operations did so as well, around a week later. The call for tenders in Alberta arose when the Alberta Roadbuilders and Heavy Construction Association learned that more than US$380 million worth of road contracts are likely to be handed over to Emcon, a
July 25, 2018 Read time: 2 mins
Snow joke: Alberta highway maintenance contractors are serious about wanting tenders for contracts being done by failed Carillion (photo courtesy Emcon)
Road contractors in the Canadian province of Alberta are demanding tenders be conducted for maintenance contracts that are currently run by 2435 Carillion, now in receivership.


Carillion, based in the UK, went into receivership in January, and its Canadian operations did so as well, around a week later.

The call for tenders in Alberta arose when the Alberta Roadbuilders and Heavy Construction Association learned that more than US$380 million worth of road contracts are likely to be handed over to Emcon, a highways contractor based in the neighbouring province of British Columbia. The association says Alberta firms should be given a chance to bid for the work.

“We have nothing against competition coming in from another province. An open [bidding] process, that’s all we wanted to see come out of this,” Ron Glen, head of the roadbuilders association, reportedly said.

Carillion Canada holds three of eight of Alberta’s highway maintenance contracts amounting to around 43% of contracted work in the province. Emcon Services stands to take over the work within the next four to five years.


Emcon president Frank Rizzardo has said his firm stands ready to take up the work pending a ruling from a bankruptcy judge, likely this month. But “nothing is final”, he said.

In March, the province said it was going to pay Carillion Canada another $6.8 million to ensure it can pay its supply chain partners and subcontractors in order for it to meet its road maintenance obligations.

Carillion Canada is said to control more than 300 snowplows, around half of all Alberta showploughs. It employs about 300 workers during the winter and up to 500 in summer.

Finance & Funding

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • New international trade crossing linking Canada and US
    June 9, 2015
    The Detroit River is short, only 45km, and narrow in places, less than 1km. Around a quarter of the annual $658 billion Canada-US trade crosses over the river. That’s $160 billion worth of goods trucked each year between Detroit in the US state of Michigan and the Canadian city of Windsor in the province of Ontario - the Windsor-Detroit Corridor. There are several types of crossings, but the vast majority of commercial traffic must use the 2.3km Ambassador Bridge (see box). A new bridge was initially prop
    Read More
  • ACE/AECOM report: private sector and user-pay for English roads
    May 14, 2018
    It’s one minute to midnight for funding England’s roads, according to a timely new report, and the clock’s big hand is pointing to some form of user-pay solution, reports David Arminas Is there any way out of future user-pay funding for England’s highway infrastructure? The answer is a resounding ‘no’, according to the recently published report: Funding Roads for the Future. The brief 25-page document by the London-based Association for Consultancy and Engineering, ACE**, sums up the state of England’s ro
    Read More
  • Bomag’s president Ralf Junker puts his faith in BIM
    November 8, 2017
    World Highways recently caught up with Ralf Junker, president of BOMAG Group, during the company’s Innovation Days at its headquarters in Germany. David Arminas reports. Ralf Junker hasn’t forgotten his roots. You can put as much machine control as you like on a piece of construction equipment but all that high-technology is for nothing if the build quality isn’t there. Junker knows something about build quality. When he started at BOMAG in 1988, he was in the welding shop, eventually becoming supervisor
    Read More
  • Montreal’s new Champlain Bridge is shaping up for Christmas
    September 10, 2018
    Montreal’s Champlain Bridges - one going up, one coming down, reports David Arminas The importance of the new Champlain Bridge to Montreal and Canada can’t be overstated, given the crumbling nature of the not-so-old original Champlain Bridge. The original steel truss affair across the St Lawrence River and the adjacent St Lawrence Seaway canal is “a lifeline for residents and businesses” in greater Montréal, according to the national Auditor General - the public sector spending watchdog. “It accommodates
    Read More

Highlighted Content