WATCH: ‘Rexy’, One of Two TBMs for the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension, Breaks Through the Final Wall

Tunnelling for the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension is a big step closer to completion as Rexy reached its destination.

Courtesy of Metrolinx

TORONTO – One tunnel boring machine (TBM) excavating for the western underground segment of the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension has broken through the final wall.

RT&S has reported previously on the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension. The project includes 7 new stations along a 9.2 km route. Now, a 750-ton, 131-meter long TBM has emerged at the Scarlett Road extraction shaft where it will be “disassembled and removed from the ground.” According to Metrolinx, the TBM, also known as “Rexy”, has spent “two years carefully excavating one of two 6.3-kilometer tunnels that stretches from Renforth Drive from Scarlett Road, where the future line will come to the surface and transition to an above-ground section.”

The second TBM, “Renny”, will emerge at the extraction shaft in the coming weeks. After the TBMs are disassembled, they will be removed from the ground “piece by piece.” Metrolinx reports that work will continue at the shaft to lay foundations to form a structure. In addition, work will begin to prepare “construction sites for the eastern underground segment of the line that will run from east of Jane Street to Mount Dennis Station.”