Yeah, but....
What the city never mentions is that when they specified their desires in the new street cars, there had never been one like it in the world engineered.
1. Must be 100' long, but also must be able to turn on the City's existing trackage where turning radiuses are VERY tight. (I believe, but could be wrong, a 30' radius.) Unheard of for streets cars this long. The old street cars are 15 m long.
2. All of TTC track switches use a single point set up. I.e. only one rail moves. (Normal is both rails move.) Makes turning that much more difficult. TTC did not and does not want to change all of its switches to a modern standard, so they made it Bombardier's problem.
3. Low floors for ease of access.
4. Must use TTC's rather antiquated power delivery system.
My understanding is that points 1 and 2 were major engineering hurdles for Bombardier to overcome. As usual, the beancounters never listen to the Engineers and the politicians will bray away about how BBD has dropped the ball whenever the public asks WTF is going on. BBD, however, wisely keeps its mouth shut.
Add in the additional stress of the cost to manufacture, dealing with union nonsense where everything is double time and it's a miracle they are getting built at all.
