You may already know that we fit new, longer trains into SkyTrain stations built 40 years ago. But, there’s another side to this story you won’t see out on the system.

Last month, we officially completed SkyTrain’s biggest internal facility upgrade in 40 years. The not-so-secret Operations and Maintenance Centre, located near Edmonds Station in Burnaby, is the heart of the SkyTrain system.

You’ve probably clocked a few large buildings and our train yard between 22nd and Edmonds stations — lovingly referred to as “OMC1” throughout our organization (we love acronyms!). This is our primary train maintenance and storage facility.

It’s also home to SkyTrain Control: the wizards behind the curtain that oversee the entire system and provide eyes-in-the-sky support to field staff; think of them as the “brain” of SkyTrain.

The Province of BC is building the upcoming Broadway Subway and Surrey Langley SkyTrain extensions. However, to enable this network expansion and support almost 21 additional kilometres of SkyTrain, TransLink is just as busy.

We’re now several years into an unprecedented infrastructure expansion to support the growing network and more riders than SkyTrain has ever seen. Construction of new facilities to expand our operational, storage, and maintenance capacity, modernization and expansion of back-end systems, delivery of new fleet, and much more is well underway.

The upgrades at OMC1 are a big piece of this puzzle.

A brief history

Since opening for service in 1985, OMC1 has supported the SkyTrain network’s massive growth. This includes the original phased construction of the Expo Line through 1994, the addition of the Millennium Line in 2002, and the Evergreen Extension of the Millennium Line in 2016.

The SkyTrain system is now four times its original size and keeps growing. We added the smaller OMCs 2 and 3 for extra storage and maintenance with the Millennium Line and its extension, but our core OMC1 is still where most of the magic happens. This main facility has undergone smaller upgrades over the years, like added maintenance lanes, storage tracks, and admin spaces — but this is the largest yet.

In our 2012 Expo Line Upgrade Strategy, we were planning decades into the future and first identified the need for longer, higher-capacity trains to meet future service demands. As part of the study, we investigated the upgrades required to allow our current SkyTrain infrastructure to accommodate longer trains on the system and behind the scenes.

Bringing Mark V to Metro Vancouver

Our new trains had outgrown OMC1’s original infrastructure, so we had to get to work! The Edmonds OMC Upgrade Project made it possible for Mark V trains to join our fleet while our new storage and maintenance facility in Coquitlam is under construction.

We built a brand new, expanded 55,000-square-foot barn to boost SkyTrain’s storage and maintenance capacity, housing:

• More room with additional, longer train maintenance bays
• Double the previous rail maintenance and equipment space
• Dedicated staff offices and break areas
• Some very cool and modern equipment, like mobile lifting jacks and a mobile wheel lathe (more on that in a future story)

In addition, we extended our vehicle cleaning and inspection facility by about 28 metres in order to fit an entire Mark V train. We also upgraded some storage and support rooms at OMC2 across the street, to further support SkyTrain expansion.

This once-in-a-generation upgrade not only enables the use of Mark V trains and further system expansion, but also provides much-needed improvements for SkyTrain staff. Crews now work in spaces better designed for their respective roles.

This is a long-awaited step toward the future of SkyTrain and improving operations for staff and riders alike.

The next stop is…

Across the street from OMC1 (near OMC2), you may have noticed a mysterious stainless steel building that’s been under construction for years; you can see it while riding by on the SkyTrain. To keep pace with a growing network, we need to expand our SkyTrain Operations Control capacity. If OMC1 is the heart of SkyTrain, this new building will be the brain of our evolving system. Stay tuned for more!