The region of York, located North of Toronto was experiencing rapid growth. VivaNext was developed to facilitate community transit. The H2VMC phase was valued at $158 million and was built by Kiewit-EllisDon (KED) Joint Venture.

The work consisted of widening 4.2 kilometres along Highway 7 between Highway 400 and the GO Bradford/Barrie Railway line in the city of Vaughan. This section of the vivaNext program comprised regular VIVA Platforms Stations and one Large Vaughan Metropolitan Centre (VMC) Station at the intersection of Highway 7 and Millway Street. The VMC Station also houses the extension of the Toronto-York Spadina subway system.

This project provided KED with opportunities to show innovative building practices. Some of these practices included: building the large glass and steel VMC Station structure (45 metres long by 24 metres wide and 8.9 metres high), in the middle of a high traffic roadway, widening an existing 150m long bridge over Canada’s busiest train marshaling yard, extending two waterway culverts, building over 1,600m of retaining wall, relocating approximately 6km of multiple hydro primary and secondary circuits as well as telephone and cable lines (above and below ground). All of this work was done while maintaining three lanes of live traffic in each direction along Highway 7.

The vivaNext Program consisted of three segments of the overall Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system in the York Region with expansion and construction of several overpass structures.

• D1: The project involved widening 3.3 km of Davis Dr. in Newmarket’s business core to add two dedicated centre bus rapidway lanes.
• H2VMC: The project included 4.4 km of rapidway, four state-of-the-art station platforms, the signature Vaughan Metropolitan Centre, pedestrian walkways and other infrastructure.
• H3: The project included adding two dedicated bus lanes to the existing six lanes on Hwy. 7; as well as widening of Apple Creek and Warden Avenue structures.

The vivaNext project team won several awards for designing and building a transit system in an urban corridor with active public transport and allows users to move between urban centers and other destinations in the York region:

• Ontario Public Works Association – 2013 Project of the Year – transportation category, project over 50 M$; for its excellence in the management of public project and Engineering, Architecture and Construction
• American Public Works Association – 2014 Project of the Year – transportation category, project over $ 75 million; for good project performance
• Revue Roads & Bridges – The H3 segment named in the top 10 of road projects underway in 2015