COCHRANE— Several residents on Fireside Parkway across from the new school construction site have noticed strange cracks appearing in the concrete slab in their basements.
One of those residents, Sean Veraart, said he believes the damages were caused by the ongoing construction project across the street from his house.
“Basically, they’re doing density compaction on the school construction site across the street from our property, and during that process, it caused cracks in the slab and those cracks have opened up.”
Veraart said he was not aware of the cracks until a neighbour brought the damage in their house to his attention. He and his neighbours notified the contractors about the damage and they immediately stopped the compacting process.
“We contacted CANA immediately when we noticed the damage and from that point on the construction site has been shut down,” he said. “It hasn’t moved since.”
The company that was contracted to build the school, CANA Construction, has been working with the residents of Fireside Parkway, going house by house and cataloging the damages.
“CANA has been, so far, very good to deal with,” he said. “They haven’t given us any confirmation as to what they’re going to do to remedy the situation, but they have been very responsive.”
He noted that while CANA has not admitted any fault as of yet, the representatives have been working with the homeowners, compiling information to take to their engineers, and will decide a course of action on the situation after some consideration.
Veraart said when the density compaction process began, the machinery was so powerful he could feel it shake the ground.
“I really noticed it because we drive by there to drop my daughter off, and even driving in a vehicle the ground shaking from that hammer— That equipment hitting the ground— Was quite extensive.”
Veraart said he feels confident the construction is what caused the cracks to appear in the concrete slab in his basement. The timing of the damage appearing in his and his neighbour's homes are too strange to be coincidence.
“There was no damage on that slab. We were down there probably a day or two before they commenced. Aside from small hairline cracks, which is normal in a concrete basement slab, those were not there. Right when they commenced and our neighbour told us about it there were these large opening cracks in our slab that were not there before,” he said. “It’s beyond coincidental that when you talk to the other neighbours that they have the same damage right when the construction started. Common sense would dictate that it’s related to the construction project.”
Growing up, Veraart’s family owned a construction company. Veraart himself has a background in engineering, and spent eight years in the homebuilding industry working on various construction projects, before making a change into business. He now manages the Springhill RV Park, where he has completed several construction projects throughout his 15 years managing that property.
With small cracks in concrete sometimes filling them with a reparative solution would do the trick, but Veraart said that he believes, based on the size and width of the cracks, the concrete would need to be completely removed and repoured to be properly fixed.
“With those cracks opening like that, you can’t just seal them. My concern would be even the subgrade, if it’s been disturbed underneath it, that means you’re going to have voids underneath that slab. That whole slab to be done properly would have to be jackhammered out and recompacted and repoured.”
From what he can see of the foundational structure where there is no vapor barrier and insulation, he said, there does not appear to be cracks, but he has not yet had an opportunity to remove the barriers to inspect the entire foundation.
“At this point, we don’t have any visual or structural foundation damage, it’s just the slab itself, which is not a structural component of the property,” he said.
Veraart has not seen any other signs of foundational damage, like cracking in the drywall in the upper floors of the house, or bulging screws.
He said he hopes that CANA returns with a plan to do the project “properly” he said, which would be to remove the concrete, repack the substrate and repour the concrete.
“If there is differential settlement underneath that slab, as time goes by the damage is going to get worse, so just filling those cracks in, I don’t think would suffice.”
Veraart is fairly certain there has been some settlement in the substrate underneath the slab, due to both the cracking and heaving around the cracks that has caused portions of the concrete to bulge.
Acting general manager of development and community services, Riley Weldon, said the Town has heard from some residents about the construction project and has given their contact information to CANA, so they can be contacted by the construction company directly.
Weldon said CANA is required to follow a development permit process to ensure that the project's plans are in line with the standards of the Town.
“We have our requirements through that process which include engineering drawings,” he said. “The Town reviews those drawing to make sure that they’re in line with our standards."
While the Town does look at the stability of the substrate as part of that process, it does not necessarily happen at the time of development permitting.
“Those types of tests occur usually earlier on in the process, so at the time of subdivision, for example, or at the time of land use designation or rezoning," he said.
When the subdivision was created it was done so under a subdivision master plan, which did include plans for the school, meaning the land was not rezoned prior to construction.
During that phase, while the subdivision was being planned, ground stability tests did occur, Weldon said.
CANA Construction declined requests for comment from The Cochrane Eagle.
