Edmonton Valley Line West

The Valley Line LRT spans 27 km, connecting Mill Woods and Lewis Farms in Edmonton. The project consists of two stages, including the construction of an elevated guideway on 87 Avenue and stations at Misericordia Hospital and West Edmonton Mall. Spannovation was contracted by Fast + Epp to design the superstructure for the Misericordia (MIS) and West Edmonton Mall (WEM) Stations. The superstructure featured prestressed box girders, reinforced neoprene bearing pads, and a composite concrete deck with a non-composite topping. The design prioritized fitting within space constraints and meeting strict deflection criteria for pedestrian live loads (<10 mm).

The MIS station comprised five spans with two simply supported box beams in each span, with the longest span measuring approximately 26m. The station was symmetric about its longitudinal axis and utilized two types of prestressed box girders: 1100 mm wide and 1400 mm deep, and 700 mm wide and 1400 mm deep. Similarly, the WEM station consisted of five spans, with the longest span being approximately 24m. All box beams in both stations were 1200 mm wide and 1300 mm deep.

Spannovation independently verified the load take-off for box girders and bearings and utilized SAP 2000 finite element models to analyze demand distribution between the girders for various span configurations and applied loads. We also provided load effects for designing steel diaphragms and connections to Fast + Epp. The prestressed concrete box girder design adhered to the National Building Code of Canada 2019 - Alberta Edition and CSA A23.1, while the reinforced neoprene bearing pads followed Section 11 of the Canadian Highway Bridge Design (CHBDC), 2019.