Ontario Bid Brief · Issue 20

Tuesday, October 13, 2026

A roofer from Concord submitted the lowest price on a Durham water plant roof this summer and did not get the job. That result, plus a Peel tree contract decided by $780, is in the awards below. Durham and Halton were quiet on the open side this week, so Hamilton and Oakville carry the picks. The Signal is about the buildings most trades crews scroll right past.

1. Foundation Waterproofing, Leak Repair, Drainage, Concrete, Asphalt and Masonry Services, Peel Living Region of Peel · 2026-303T · closes Wed Oct 21, 12:00 PM ET · 41 plan takers

One tender covers below-grade waterproofing, leak repair, drainage, concrete, asphalt and masonry across multiple Peel Living housing properties. The title says services at various properties, which usually means unit rates or call-out work over a term. Confirm in the documents how work gets assigned.

Estimated value: $250K to $800K over the term (estimate, confirm on the portal)

Incumbent read: this scope has no prior award in our archive. The closest Peel Living comp is the Fletcher's View targeted wall repair from Issue 14, which Global Forces Construction won at $64,350 with three bids. The housing portfolio is clearly working through water ingress. The Cliff Road envelope job we first ran in Issue 13 is still on the board, now closing Oct 19.

Worth bidding if: you self-perform waterproofing or concrete and can carry or sub the other trades. Forty-one plan takers is the biggest room on the board this week, but a multi-trade services file splits that room. Most of those firms will only price the part they do.

2. Environmental Laboratory HVAC System and Associated Upgrades, 700 Woodward Avenue WWTP, Hamilton City of Hamilton · C13-02-26 · closes Tue Nov 10, 3:00 PM ET · 0 plan takers

HVAC replacement and related upgrades for the environmental lab at Hamilton's main wastewater plant. Lab air handling is tighter work than an office swap, so expect pressurization and exhaust requirements to shape the design.

Estimated value: $400K to $1.2M (estimate)

Incumbent read: our archive has no prior award for this lab, and the listing does not name the original installer. Woodward is an active capital site. We covered the primary clarifiers tender there in Issue 3, and a low voltage electrical prequalification for the Woodward water treatment plant is open right now.

Worth bidding if: you are a commercial HVAC contractor with lab or healthcare air handling experience. Zero plan takers with four weeks of runway means the room is wide open today. The Signal below explains why plant files stay this quiet.

3. Backstop Replacement, Neyagawa Park and Cornwall Road Sports Park, Oakville Town of Oakville · RFT-77-2026 · closes Fri Oct 23, 2:00 PM ET · 4 plan takers

Replacement of ball diamond backstops at two Oakville parks. Seven documents are attached, so check the drawings for footing and fabric specs before you price.

Estimated value: $80K to $250K (estimate)

Incumbent read: our archive has no prior Oakville backstop or fencing award. The most recent fence file we covered was the Newhaven Manor timber fence in Peel, back in Issue 17.

Worth bidding if: you install chain link or sports fencing and can get footings in this fall if the schedule calls for it. Four plan takers on a two-park job is a small room, and fencing crews are coming off their busy season.

4. General Contractor, Hamilton Stadium Artificial Turf Replacement City of Hamilton · C13-25-26 · closes Thu Nov 5, 3:00 PM ET · 2 plan takers

Hamilton is replacing the artificial turf at its stadium and wants a general contractor to carry the job. Turf replacement usually covers removal and disposal of the old system, base repair and the new install.

Estimated value: $1.5M to $3M (estimate, one of the larger files we have run)

Incumbent read: the listing does not name the original installer. Sports turf runs through a short bench of specialist installers in Ontario. When we ran Peel's artificial turf baseball diamond in Issue 8, it drew seven plan takers. Expect the GC to carry a turf specialist as a sub unless an installer primes it directly.

Worth bidding if: you are a sports field contractor or a sitework GC with a turf partner lined up. Two plan takers with more than three weeks to go is a thin room for a high-profile Hamilton job.

5. Bridge and Culvert Deck Asphalt Patching, Oakville Town of Oakville · RFQ-28-2026 · closes Wed Oct 21, 2:00 PM ET · 14 plan takers

Asphalt patching on bridge and culvert decks across Oakville. It is an RFQ, which points to a smaller dollar value and a short scope.

Estimated value: $50K to $200K (estimate)

Incumbent read: our archive has no prior deck patching award. The last Oakville paving award we covered was the Central Ops Depot east parking lot in Issue 17, which went for $982,306.60 with 4 bids from 20 plan takers. That job was far bigger, but the conversion rate is the useful number. Oakville paving rooms shrink fast between download and submission.

Worth bidding if: you run a paving crew that does small hot mix patching and can handle traffic control on a structure. Deck work means care around expansion joints and any waterproofing membrane, so read the spec before you treat this as routine patching.

Roof Replacement, Oshawa WSP Plant 2 Settling Tank Region of Durham · T-1006-2026 · closed Thu Aug 20 · 25 plan takers, 10 bids Winner: Eileen Roofing Inc. (Toronto) · $455,200

The low bid did not win. Always Roofing of Concord came in at $435,630 and Crawford Roofing at $452,400, and Durham awarded the job to the third-lowest number, $19,570 above the low. The award notice does not say why. When a low bid gets passed over on municipal work, it usually traces back to a compliance or qualification problem in the submission. Ten of 25 plan takers bid, and the high number from Tectra Group was $1,020,800, 2.3 times the low. This is at least the third low bid we have seen lose this year, after the Mississauga picnic shelters in Issue 11 and the Oakville OTCC stairwell in Issue 14.

Tree Trimming and Removal Services, Region of Peel Region of Peel · 2026-292T · closed Mon Aug 17 · 16 plan takers, 11 bids in the results we pulled Winner: Ashley's Touch Tree Care (Toronto) · $233,680

Decided by $780. 2008949 Ontario Ltd of Acton bid $234,460, a 0.3 percent gap on a $233K contract. Five bids landed under $300,000, then the field spread out all the way to Greenbrier Landscaping at $796,536, 3.4 times the winner. Kodiak Tree Services bid $485,200, about double the winning number. Kodiak won Burlington's woodland risk mitigation in Issue 18 at $47,541, so the sharpest number on one board can sit well up the range on the next.

Supply and Installation of Transit Bus Shelters, Burlington City of Burlington · RFT-26-329 · closed Tue Aug 18 · 4 plan takers, 2 bids Winner: Cityscape Sign Systems Inc. (Mississauga) · $240,373.60 (winning bid, Burlington publishes the winner without an award value)

Cityscape beat Daytech Limited by $6,328, a 2.6 percent gap. Two general contractors, Emmacon and GTC Canada, pulled the documents and did not bid. On supply and install work, the firm that makes or sources the product sets the price, and a GC adding markup on someone else's shelter has a hard time getting under it.

EV Charging Station Accessibility, Peel Region Headquarters, 7120 Hurontario Region of Peel · 2026-390T · closed Fri Aug 21 · 20 plan takers, 5 bids Winner: AC Contracting Inc. (Mississauga) · $142,111

We ran this one open in Issue 11 with an estimate of $200K to $600K. The winning number came in under our low end, and we will own that miss. AC Contracting won by $72,544 over Energy Network Services at $214,655, a 51 percent gap. Ferguson Electric, the only bidder with Electric in its name, came third at a flat $250,000. Three more firms with Electric in their names pulled the documents and passed. The high bid from MJ.K. Construction was $377,709, 2.7 times the winner. Five bids from 20 plan takers on an electrical retrofit at an occupied headquarters tells you most of the room decided the phasing was not worth pricing.

Hamilton's Woodward Avenue wastewater plant has an environmental lab that needs a new HVAC system. When we pulled the board, the tender had zero plan takers and four weeks left to run.

Part of that is timing, since new files often sit empty for their first few days. Plant tenders run thin for another reason too. Most building trades contractors see "Wastewater Treatment Plant" in a title and file it under heavy civil, in the same bucket as sewers and watermains. They stop reading before they ever reach the word HVAC.

That habit costs them work. A treatment plant is a campus. It has labs, offices, garages, electrical rooms and roofs, and every one of them wears out on the same schedule as a community centre. The Oshawa settling tank roof in this week's awards proves it. It was a straight commercial roof replacement, and ten roofers bid it. Back in Issue 8, Peel tendered an artificial turf baseball diamond at a water plant site.

Plant work does come with gates a normal building job skips. Plants run around the clock, so you work around operators who cannot shut down for you. Site safety orientations and confined space rules show up in the specs. Some of the larger packages are limited to prequalified contractors, like the low voltage electrical prequalification at Hamilton's Woodward water treatment plant that closes Nov 5. Read the instructions to bidders before you price.

For a building trades firm that can handle those conditions, the competition math can beat a library or an arena. The firms that live at these sites are mostly process and civil contractors chasing the big mechanical packages. The building scopes can fall between the two crowds.

The BD move costs nothing. Add the plant names in your region to your portal searches next to your trade. In Hamilton that is Woodward. In Halton it is Skyway and Mid-Halton. In Peel it is Clarkson and Lakeview. In Durham it is Harmony Creek and the Whitby plant. Then open every plant file that lands and read past the title to the scope.

If one of these files fits a crew you know, forward this to them and hit reply to tell me which one you're pricing.