Keynote Speakers
Wednesday, May 28
Panel Discussion: Alternate Delivery for Transportation Infrastructure Projects
Rick Haldane-Wilsone, MSc, PEng
Civil Pursuits Manager at PCL Construction
Rick has over 30 years of experience in the design and construction of bridge and transportation civil infrastructure. With 20 years in consulting, Rick progressed from a junior design engineer to VP of Transportation. He led design teams on numerous Alternate Delivery Projects (ADP) including the Disraeli Bridges Project P3. Since 2013, Rick has been at PCL with his focus being to pursue and execute large, ADP civil infrastructure projects including the Southwest Rapid Transit (Phase 2) P3 project. Rick has led or helped pursue transportation and civil ADP for PCL across Canada totaling over $5B.
Brad Neirinck, PEng
Engineering Manager, Public Works Department, City of Winnipeg
Brad is the Manager of Engineering with the City of Winnipeg. He is responsible for overseeing the delivery of major bridge and road projects, some of which have involved P3 alternate service delivery methods including the Charleswood Bridge Project, Disraeli Bridges Project, Chief Peguis Trail and Phase 2 of the Southwest Rapid Transit Corridor. Brad graduated from the University of Manitoba in 1987 with a BSc. (CE) and has over 38 years of transportation infrastructure experience in consulting engineering, with the Province of Manitoba, and the City of Winnipeg.
Cynthia Ritchie
Assistant Deputy Minister of Infrastructure Capital Projects Division, MTI
Cynthia oversees execution of a capital infrastructure budget exceeding $600 million per year and is accountable for overall capital planning, project management and innovation in capital delivery. Before joining MTI, Cynthia worked for the City of Winnipeg in the Infrastructure Planning Office, providing leadership in project management, asset management and investment planning. She was a key contributor to the development of the City’s first Infrastructure Plan, identifying and prioritizing more than $5.8 billion in capital needs over a 10-year period. Cynthia holds an MBA from the Asper School of Business and a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science and has completed certifications in Change Management, Asset Management and Six Sigma.
Dr. Emile Shehata, PhD, PEng
Senior Vice President at Tetra Tech
Dr. Emile Shehata is the Senior Vice President of Tetra Tech Canada Inc. (Tetra Tech), with 30 years of experience in Canada. His distinctive experience ties together technical research and design with corporate management. Dr. Shehata brings forward a strength of technically comprehensive and practical leadership, while demonstrating a sound depth of understanding of the significance of meeting timelines and budgetary constraints on a project. His engineering experience includes a diverse portfolio of complex, multidisciplinary transportation and transit infrastructure-based projects, with roles as Design Manager, Project Manager, and Structural Lead on many large scale public private partnerships, design build projects, and traditional design bid build projects.
Thursday, May 29
Recent Advances in Bridge Deck Technologies and Fatigue Testing In Canada
Dr. Amir Fam, PhD, Peng
Professor & Vice Dean Research, Smith Engineering, CRC, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada
Professor Amir Fam is the Vice-Dean (Research) of Smith Engineering and a Tier I Canada Research Chair in Climate Change Resilient Infrastructure at Queen’s University, Canada. He is the President of the International Institute for FRP in Construction (IIFC), Co-Editor of the Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering and Associate Editor of the Journal of Composites for Construction. He is an internationally leading authority in FRP for construction research, including FRP stay-in-place structural forms. He is the founder of the Rolling Load Simulator (ROLLS) facility for testing bridges, the only one in Canada. Prof. Fam has >420 refereed publications, including >230 journal papers (h-index of 57, Google Scholar). He is an elected Fellow of 8 professional bodies including the Canadian Academy of Engineering, IIFC, ASCE, CSCE and ACI.
Abstract
This study is the first of its kind to assess fatigue behavior of glass fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP)-reinforced bridge decks under moving loads in the laboratory. A full-scale concrete bridge deck (15.24 m x 3.89 m) was tested under rolling load fatigue using Canada’s only Rolling Load Simulator (ROLLS) at Queen’s University. The deck, supported by steel girders spaced at 3.05 m, was reinforced with various materials, including GFRP rebar, GFRP stay-in-place (SIP) structural forms and steel rebar, to assess fatigue behavior. Shear studs ensured composite action, and cross braces provided lateral support, in compliance with the Canadian Highway Bridge Design Code (CHBDC) requirements. The deck was divided into four sections in the longitudinal direction: two end sections reinforced with GFRP rebar and subjected to stationary pulsating (P)-load and rolling (R)-load, respectively, and two middle sections—one with GFRP SIP form and top rebar, and the other with conventional steel rebar—both under R-load. Each section underwent 3 million (3M) fatigue cycles, except the steel-reinforced section, which experienced 6M due to its position within the travel path. The fatigue damage resulted by P-load and R-load is compared, and the fatigue performance of bridge decks with various reinforcement is assessed with R-load. R-load resulted in greater fatigue damage than P-load, with a 71% and 54% reduction in stiffness (k/ko) for the GFRP-reinforced sections, indicating that one R-cycle equates to 120 P-cycles. Significant cracking and concrete pitting were observed at sections under R-load. A conversion factor of 0.59 at 3M cycles, projected to 0.5 at 10M cycles, was established to translate stiffness degradation from P-load to R-load for concrete bridge decks reinforced with GFRP rebar. GFRP SIP section performed similarly to GFRP rebar in terms of stiffness degradation, with 60% lower residual deflection at 3M cycles. Nearly 90% of stiffness reduction occurred within the first 0.4M cycles. GFRP-reinforced sections experienced very similar reduction in stiffness to that of the steel-reinforced section of 69%, at 3M R-loading cycles. Despite the difference in stiffness degradation, both GFRP rebar reinforced sections exhibited similar residual punching shear strength (Vu), with only a 4% difference. It was also shown that Vu under 2-half axles spaced at 1.2 m increases by only 34% compared to a single load because of the overlapping of punching shear cones. A nonlinear finite element model, validated by experimental data, accurately simulated deck behavior under P-load and R-load. A parametric study examined the impact of moving direction, load location, and load level.
Civil Infrastructure at Crossroads: Decarbonization, AI Innovation, and the Path to Net-Zero
Dr. Moncef L. Nehdi, PhD, Peng
Dean of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada
Dr. Nehdi is Dean of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences at the University of Guelph and Emeritus Professor at Western and McMaster. He is a fellow of multiple professional organizations, Dr. Nehdi received numerous awards and recognition. He held leadership positions at the intersection of engineering innovation, education, and industry and led transformative research advancing sustainable and resilient civil infrastructure. Former Technical Manager for three firms, his work shaped landmark projects including some world’s tallest buildings and infrastructure icons. Author of over 500 publications, he was ranked among the world’s most impactful civil engineers by Elsevier.
Abstract
As climate change intensifies into an existential threat, Canada has responded with decisive policy action. The enactment of the Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act in June 2021 legally commits the nation to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Complementing this legislative milestone, Canada’s 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan outlines an ambitious, sector-by-sector roadmap to reduce emissions by 40% below 2005 levels by 2030. Yet, civil infrastructure — particularly cement and concrete — remains among the most intractable sectors for decarbonization, challenged by surging demand driven by rapid urbanization, population growth, and the critical need to rehabilitate aging infrastructure. This challenge is further compounded by the phasing out of coal-fired power generation, rendering fly ash increasingly scarce, and by the transition of steel production toward electrification and hydrogenation, diminishing the availability of blast furnace slag — both essential supplementary cementitious materials. Simultaneously, buildings account for nearly 40% of Canada’s energy consumption, with most operational energy still derived from fossil fuels. The imperative to simultaneously reduce both embodied and operational carbon emissions in the built environment demands a transformative, transdisciplinary research agenda. This keynote presentation critically examines the systemic barriers facing civil engineering education and practice and articulates a forward-looking strategy to drive the global shift toward sustainable and resilient infrastructure. It advances a novel integrative framework that couples systems thinking, deep generative artificial intelligence, and performance-based design methodologies to not only mitigate carbon emissions across the infrastructure life cycle but also to enhance systemic resilience against an increasingly uncertain climate future.
Friday, May 30
Shifting Ground: Permafrost Challenges in a Changing Canadian North
Dr. Jocelyn L. Hayley, PhD, PEng,
Professor (Geotechnical) in the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calgary, AB, Canada
Dr. Jocelyn Hayley is a Professor (Geotechnical) in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Calgary. Her research focuses on understanding how to mitigate and adapt to the impact of climate change in permafrost and offshore sediments, with a focus on soil behaviour. She has been recognized with Fellowship in the Engineering Institute of Canada and Canadian Academy of Engineering, been awarded the EIC Canadian Pacific Railway Engineering Medal, the APEGA Women in Engineering and Geoscience Champion Award, delivered the 2022 Canadian Geotechnical Society Hardy Address, and the 2024 Canadian Geotechnical Society Cross Canada Lecture Tour. Jocelyn has also served in academic leadership positions, including Head of Civil Engineering and Senior Associate Dean Research. She is the President-Elect of the Canadian Permafrost Association.
Abstract
Thawing of once frozen permafrost, is irrevocably altering the landscape of our Canadian North. As the once stable ground shifts and moves, overlying infrastructure is subject to damage; imminently threatening our ability to connect communities, provide stable housing, and protect our Arctic. Amplified temperature rise, accompanied by volatile weather patterns, impacts the fragile permafrost ecosystem adding uncertainty to our social, economic, and environmental future. Recent case histories help us understand the current state of practice in permafrost geotechnical engineering: the innovations; the challenges; and the opportunities, while formation of extended and inclusive communities of practice and co-development of knowledge set the scene for a vibrant future as we explore forward-looking climate adaptation and continued sustainability in our Canadian North.
Civil Engineering and Our Social Responsibility: How Can We Better Serve
Dr. Mohamed Nagib AbouZeid, PhD
Professor of Construction Engineering, the American University in Cairo, New Cairo, Egypt
Dr. AbouZeid is a Professor of Construction Engineering at the American University in Cairo (AUC), Egypt, and a long-time contributor to the CSCE Annual Conferences. Mohamed has earned his PhD with distinction from the University of Kansas where he served as a faculty member before returning to AUC. He has held several positions including Chairing the Department of Construction and Architecture Engineering, Dean of the School of Science and Engineering and the University Senate Chair. Mohamed was elected as the first chair from outside North America of the international center for academic integrity in Duke University. Dr. AbouZeid’s research domain includes advanced & sustainable construction materials, repair of structures and quality of education.
Abstract
Civil Engineering is a relatively wide discipline that engulfs numerous activities and specializations the impacts the quality of life of everyone on planet earth. Over the past decades, much of the civil engineering efforts and ingenuity have focused on the wide-scale and high-performance projects with best possible economic merits. With many drastic changes taking place around us which are intertwined with increased poverty, climate change and regional conflicts, a pivotal question arises: How far are we embracing our social responsibilities and to which extent do we, genuinely, address that in our practices. This keynote addresses vital aspects of our social responsibilities as engineers which are often overlooked or underestimated. Examples include, misuse of resources, paying insufficient attention to poor and disadvantaged communities worldwide, lack of bold regulations against practices of high global warming potential and shifting current challenges for future generations to confront. While the keynote highlights the gravity of the issue and the dire need for immediate intervention, it also provides case studies for healthy and positive experiences from several continents that need to be shared and disseminated. The presentation suggests clear pathway to foster the social responsibility of civil engineers in particular on three fronts: Educational, Practice and Regulation. A futuristic positive outlook is discussed that pinpoints potential gains and benefits that can prevail for both the advantaged and the less advantaged communities upon adoption of these concepts.