When exactly will the Broadway Subway open?

Concrete floor pour in a Broadway Subway tunnel looking east from Mount Pleasant Station, as of October 2023. (Government of BC)

Both tunnel-boring machines for SkyTrain’s Millennium Line Broadway Extension are now at the pit of the future Oak-VGH subway station.

This represents the halfway mark for the two tunnel-boring machines responsible for building the subway segment of the extension reaching Arbutus. Traveling from east to west, Oak-VGH Station is the fourth of six new subway stations.

In a bulletin today, the provincial government states the tunnel-boring machine named Elsie broke through Oak-VGH Station’s east wall at Laurel Street just after 10 am this past Saturday.

This comes 17 days after her sister, Phyllis, made the same breakthrough on October 12 at this particular station site, which will directly serve Vancouver General Hospital and the growing Central Broadway business and medical office district.

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Elsie is responsible for boring the eastbound tunnel, while Phyllis is responsible for the westbound tunnel.

With the arrival at Oak-VGH Station, each machine has built parallel tunnels and together have installed over 2,600 concrete tunnel-liner rings since leaving the tunnel boring staging pit at the intersection of Great Northern Way and Thornton Street, which doubles as the subway station footprint of Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station. When staggered tunnel boring for the project first began, Elsie was initially the lead machine after starting her big dig a month earlier in early October 2022.

On August 3, Phyllis overtook her sister Elsie as the lead machine by being the first machine to resume drilling from the Cambie Street end of the pit for Broadway-City Hall Station.

It took Phyllis 70 days to complete four blocks of her tunnel from the Cambie Street end of Broadway-City Hall Station to the Laurel Street end of Oak-VGH Station, but her sister Elsie was able to make the same journey in 50 days.

After completing scheduled maintenance over the past few weeks in the pit of Oak-VGH Station, the provincial government states Phyllis is now preparing to launch towards South Granville Station, which will be another journey of four blocks to reach the Hemlock Street end of the next station. Elsie will follow once scheduled maintenance is complete.

Within each station pit, the machines are slowly shuffled from the east end of the pit to the west end of the pit to repeat the respective tunnel boring launch process.

And then after reaching South Granville Station, both machines will complete the final tunnel segment before Arbutus Station — a segment of another four blocks from Granville Street to Cypress Street, just before a block-long track switch serving Arbutus Station to enable trains to reserve, and where both machines will be extracted to the surface. The combined station pit length for the Broadway stations before Cypress Street is five blocks.

Given the length of tunnelling completed to date and the pace of work, it increasingly appears highly unlikely tunnel boring will fully reach completion before the end of 2023, as previously scheduled. Both machines currently appear far more likely to end their boring journey sometime in early 2024.

Both machines saw a considerably longer stay at the pit of Broadway-City Hall Station over the spring and summer months, compared to the relatively shorter stay within the pit of Mount Pleasant Station after breakthrough. Elsie first arrived at Broadway-City Hall Station on April 14, which was followed by Phyllis’ arrival on May 2.

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Construction progress on Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station, which doubles as the staging site for tunnel boring, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

Construction progress on Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station, which doubles as the staging site for tunnel boring, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

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Construction progress on Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station, which doubles as the staging site for tunnel boring, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

Upon inquiry, the BC Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure told Daily Hive Urbanized on October 13 that in addition to the regular maintenance activities performed on both machines at Broadway-City Hall Station, extra precautions were put in place before drilling directly beneath the Canada Line tunnel underneath Cambie Street.

With a depth of over 20 metres (about 70 ft), the Millennium Line’s Broadway-City Hall Station is the deepest amongst the six new subway stations to enable both tunnel-boring machines to safely pass under the Canada Line.

As of October 13, according to the ministry, Elsie was about two blocks away — roughly near Heather Street — from her Laurel Street breakthrough at Oak-VGH Station.

Tunnel boring for the project was originally expected to begin in Summer 2022 to enable an extension completion and opening by late 2025, but due to a five-week-long strike of Lower Mainland concrete plant workers, the timeline for completion and opening was shifted slightly to early 2026. When tunnel boring first began in Fall 2022, the provincial government indicated tunnel boring work would finish by late 2023.

But with the current unlikelihood that tunnel boring will fully finish before the end of 2023, it throws into question whether the targeted opening date could be shifted slightly again to later in 2026.

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Transition between tunnel and elevated; Elevated guideway construction progress on the Broadway Subway, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

The ministry stated today that subway station structure work — concrete walls, columns, and floors — is underway in various stages at each station. Mount Pleasant Station is the most advanced, where crews have poured the first section of concrete floor for the station’s concourse level.

However, unimpeded construction work at each station towards full completion can only begin after tunnel boring is entirely finished reaching Arbutus Station’s east wall at Cypress Street.

When inquired earlier this month, the ministry was unable to provide an update on the tunnel boring and overall project timeline, but stated that “once tunnel boring is complete, we will have more clarity on the timing of the remaining construction activities and overall project schedule.”

“The Broadway Subway Project continues to make good progress. Tunnel boring is one of the most challenging aspects of the project. Our team of experts is carrying out this work safely and methodically,” said the ministry.

But crews are almost finished with building the concrete deck for the 700-metre-long elevated guideway between the existing VCC-Clark Station and the tunnel portal immediately east of the future Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station. This concrete deck will be used for the foundation of the railway tracks.

Additionally, crews have completed the first of two concrete pours for the flat floor in the circular tunnels between Great Northern Way-Emily Carr Station and Mount Pleasant Station. This flat concrete floor will be used for the railway track foundations.

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Concrete floor pour in a Broadway Subway tunnel looking east from Mount Pleasant Station, as of October 2023. (Government of BC)

Including the short elevated guideway segment, the entire Broadway Subway project will extend the Millennium Line’s route by 5.7 km.

On a one-train ride, the travel time from Arbutus Station to Commercial-Broadway Station will be 12 minutes, and to Lafarge Lake-Douglas Station will be about 47 minutes. During peak hours, trains will run every three to four minutes.

When the extension opens, the existing 99 B-Line will run a truncated route between the bus exchange at Arbutus Station and the University of British Columbia, until the future westward extension beyond Arbutus to reach the campus is completed — possibly in the early 2030s.

If all goes as planned, visitors in Vancouver during the 2026 FIFA World Cup will also benefit from the Millennium Line extension reaching Arbutus. The World Cup will kick off on June 11, 2026.

The Millennium Line Evergreen Extension opened in December 2016 — more than a year behind its original target of Summer 2015 largely due to issues with tunnel boring and sinkhole formation. The precise opening date of the Evergreen Extension was announced almost exactly a month prior.

The Canada Line opened in August 2009, about three months ahead of schedule.

Elevated guideway construction progress on the Broadway Subway, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

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Elevated guideway construction progress on the Broadway Subway, as of October 28, 2023. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

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