Grade 4 students in Centretown will not be suggesting names for the three excavation machines that are cutting the 2.5 kilometre light rail transit tunnel through downtown Ottawa.
Secretaries from St. Anthony School, Centennial Public School, Cambridge Street Community Public School and Devonshire Public School all said their schools would not be participating in the contest. The deadline for submissions was noon on Thursday.
The four French and English public school boards in Ottawa were invited to submit one name for the excavation machines. Of the names selected for the three machines, two will be English and one French.
The city invited the students to name the machines as a way to engage them in the project, according to an Oct. 22 press release.
Mayor Jim Watson, Coun. Diane Deans, and Coun. Keith Elgi will select the names. The winning classes will attend the name unveilings at an event in November.
“Students in Grade 4 today will be entering high school by the time the [$2.1 billion] Confederation Line opens and will be among the first new wave of riders that will use the system,” said Mayor Jim Watson.
The three MT720 roadhead excavators are manufactured by a Swedish firm, Sandvik AB. The MT720 weighs 135 tonnes, is 15 meters long, and has a maximum cutting width of 9.1 metres.
The Ottawa Citizen reported that the machines are second hand and will come from New York and Australia. It is unclear whether the machines have previous names from other tunnelling projects.
Digging for the tunnel began Oct. 11 and is expected to take two years to complete.