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The long journey of six giant beer vats to Toronto

Posted by Derek Flack / January 16, 2011

Molson Beer Vats Toronto HamiltonIn addition to the TTC fare hike theatrics we witnessed earlier this week, another kind of drama was unfolding along the highways between Hamilton and Toronto. For the last few days, six giant beer vats have slowly plodded their wayt through the last 108 kilometres of a journey that started in Burgstadt, Germany and that will end sometime tonight or early tomorrow morning at the Molson Coors Brewery on Carlingview Drive. The vats were originally supposed to arrive early today, but cold weather and difficulties with hydro wires that needed to be taken down to accommodate the over-sized vehicles have led to a slight delay.

Here are a few of the somewhat staggering statistics related to the journey:

  • $24 million (cost for the tanks and the move)
  • 40+ support vehicle convoy (police cars, utility vehicles)
  • 35 police officers (to guide the trucks and control traffic)
  • 250 traffic lights taken down and put back up
  • 1600+ Hydro wires lifted or taken down to accommodate the vats)
  • More than five and a half million bottles of beer can fit in the tanks

And here's what it has looked like out on the roads (lead photo by BigBrotherBear) :

2011116-beer_vat5.jpgPhoto by jwvraets.

2011116-beer_vat4.jpgAlso by jwvraets.

2011116-beer_vats6.jpgPhoto by JDB Photos.

2011116-beer_vat7.jpgAlso by JDB Photos.

2011116-beer_vat2.jpgPhoto by Dieseltheque.

2011116-beer_vat3.jpgPhoto by Louis Tam.

Discussion

41 Comments

Stra / January 16, 2011 at 11:55 am
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awesome that someone took the time to HDR up the traveling vats lol.
al / January 16, 2011 at 12:07 pm
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My opinion regarding this city. At first sight in the news I ironically thought those vats were parts of tunnels for the underground eglinton light rail, until I sadly realized the truth, more beer=lazier and fatter torontonians.
hendrix / January 16, 2011 at 12:13 pm
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hopefully they hose down those vats with water after over a week of travel through the slushy, salty, dirty streets of the GTA.
JoeParez replying to a comment from al / January 16, 2011 at 12:29 pm
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Al, what the hell do these beer vats have to do with the city?Molson Coors purchased them and it's for their plant. Even if the Eglinton LRT was to be built they wouldn't be close to the construction of the tunnels by this point.

Stop trying to put a negative spin on everything regarding the city. Oh and people happen to love beer in this city, and they could be the fittest and healthiest people as well.

tara / January 16, 2011 at 12:38 pm
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i saw michael landsberg on a date with a teenage girl last night at black swan - u know the guy from tsn? http://thirtykzone.com/2011/01/15/spotted-michael-landsberg-at-black-swan-with-a-teenage-girl-right-now/
Joseph replying to a comment from Stra / January 16, 2011 at 12:44 pm
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Off topic reply: My guess is that they used a single RAW photo and tone-mapped it. x)
Edsel McWaWa replying to a comment from tara / January 16, 2011 at 01:19 pm
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Look at the trolling blogger desperate to get hits for his garbage blog - a blog he proudly claims got ALMOST EIGHT THOUSAND HITS IN A YEAR.

Wow.
Chino / January 16, 2011 at 01:20 pm
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holy crud. that's pretty impressive. how slowly do they move?
Kendall / January 16, 2011 at 01:37 pm
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Surely there's got to be a better way. Wouldn't it have been cheaper to have these built in place? (I'll assume the answer must be no.)

In any event, thanks for the photos. That's a *lot* of beer potential. Frightening, in fact.
Tom / January 16, 2011 at 01:52 pm
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Looks like transporting sections of one of the Apollo rockets that sent astronauts to the moon
W. K. Lis / January 16, 2011 at 01:54 pm
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Where are the SOS people complaining about why its taking so long? Probably sitting back and drinking their beer.
tron / January 16, 2011 at 02:01 pm
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Awesome. Canada needs more shitty beer.
Bubba / January 16, 2011 at 02:09 pm
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these look like the fuselage of a rocket, rocket of beer!
Sit Crapsalot replying to a comment from tara / January 16, 2011 at 02:12 pm
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Douchebag
elizabeth / January 16, 2011 at 02:14 pm
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Looks like something out of the x-files...
TG / January 16, 2011 at 02:30 pm
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Hopefully the Germans stuck a decent beer recipe inside one of the tanks.
JM / January 16, 2011 at 02:35 pm
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In 2005 London, Ontario (and a lot of Southern Ontario) had a similar situation, except there were two convoys. They were destined both for the Labatt Brewery in town.

2 Vats were used and shipped from Toronto (over 200km) and 2 were new from the same German manufacturer. They were shipped over the Atlantic to Sarnia and trucked to London from there (about the same distance as this convoy) Both had delays due to hydro lines, cold and snowsqualls.
andrewS / January 16, 2011 at 02:41 pm
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Could they have airlifted them in with one of those really big heavy-lift helicopters? Or are they too big for that?
handfed / January 16, 2011 at 03:11 pm
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Why couldn't these have been manufactured in Canada, what with the government subsidies and union pressure? Canadian exceptionalism overstated?
triage replying to a comment from tara / January 16, 2011 at 04:27 pm
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Where do you get off posting a completely off topic piece of crap, insolent and useless "celebrity news story" from a half-assed insipid blog, on a legitimate, thoughtfully edited and well-photographed Toronto news story? Really, I never comment on blogTO, just read other people's generally thoughtful comments, but screw off
P / January 16, 2011 at 05:38 pm
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@tara

Wow! great photos. The guy is in his early 50's. Ewww
SkyNet / January 16, 2011 at 06:42 pm
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I hope we all agree that they were transporting aliens :P ... yeah sure, beer...
ep replying to a comment from JoeParez / January 16, 2011 at 07:06 pm
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Exactly, what does this have to do with the city? Nothing. I'm sure molson thanks you for the free advertisement.
Sean / January 16, 2011 at 07:10 pm
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They could have placed one at the ACC and one at the Skydome* and brew the beer from there.

*Yes, I said Skydome!
Christopher / January 16, 2011 at 09:33 pm
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Cool!
JB / January 17, 2011 at 02:05 am
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Awesome photo opportunity, incredible feat of logistics.

I just kinda wish it wasn't all in the name of shitty beer.

I Still don't get why people drink Canadian or Coors when some craft brews are 50 cents more for a six pack.
Fantomex replying to a comment from JB / January 17, 2011 at 02:58 am
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@JB: <b>'I Still don't get why people drink Canadian or Coors when some craft brews are 50 cents more for a six pack.'</b>

Because there's a recession going on, HST abounds in the land, and things cost a lot-that's why people are being driven to drink said 'shitty beer'.

To be frank, and as a non-beer drinker, I really wish this was about the building of the subway or LRT, too-or maybe even the launch of spacecraft into space (the beer thingies do indeed look like parts of a Saturn V rocket.) Beer does not interest me as a beverage-I mostly like wine cooler (about once a year.)
Tara / January 17, 2011 at 03:49 am
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Thanks for all the attention you brought to my blog - people who were so upset by my spamming (one post). I got 230 hits just because of this thread - so if posting here helps me get readers I'm damn well gonna do it. Until somebody gives me a gig on this website I'll have to annoy you with my spam!
The Liquor / January 17, 2011 at 04:48 am
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Soju strikes again.

show us your tits
PaulWall replying to a comment from al / January 17, 2011 at 09:29 am
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leave beer out of it
RBeezy / January 17, 2011 at 11:14 am
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conspiracy! It's actually nuclear missile silos disguised as beer vats.
BigBrotherBear / January 17, 2011 at 12:07 pm
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I also have a video of the move on my Flickr page if you want to see how they managed to get them under power lines and through intersections
soju / January 17, 2011 at 12:35 pm
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hah! who are you liquor??? if you're on tribe post a link to my damn blog. and they're 12 years older now - trust me no one wants to see.
Derek replying to a comment from Tara / January 17, 2011 at 12:39 pm
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Actually you won't. Feel free to leave relevant comments on all of our posts, but if you spam the threads with unrelated links, I'll simply ban you for good.
Andrew / January 17, 2011 at 01:05 pm
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About 7-8 years ago, when Molson shut down their plant in Barrie, they moved 5 similar tanks down to Toronto. Same deal, slow convoy, hydro lines had to be moved. And then the tanks sat there. And sat there. And you can still see them on google maps in the north east corner of the Molson property, near Galaxy Blvd.

How come not one article about these new tanks has mentioned the expense and pain of moving the old tanks, which seem to have been wasted?
Jen replying to a comment from Andrew / January 18, 2011 at 09:44 am
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BECAUSE andrew, they are satellite transmission dishes organised by the AI to monitor our human activity. Galaxy Blvd you say? It all seems too suspicious.
Binkie / January 18, 2011 at 12:07 pm
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al, "My opinion regarding this city." is a sentence fragment, not a sentence. It has no meaning.
Where's the irony you refer to?
Do you really think anyone will start drinking more beer as a result of a factory upgrading or modernizing its facility?
Drinking too much beer interferes with the abilities to think and communicate. Maybe there's some irony here afterall, eh?
Binkie / January 18, 2011 at 12:11 pm
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Gosh Tara, thanks for that important and relevant comment on the beer vats! Have you been drinking too much beer with al?
Binkie / January 18, 2011 at 12:15 pm
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Kendall, why are you frightened by what amounts to one bottle of beer per citizen? Do you think they brew several batches per day? How much beer to you think this city already drinks, compared to what those vats will produce? Perspective, man!
Andrea replying to a comment from BigBrotherBear / January 19, 2011 at 10:30 am
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Thanks for the video link, my boyfriend was involved in the move with Bell and it was a lot of long cold nights mostly standing around.
Margrit / January 24, 2011 at 06:15 am
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Cheers :-)
Do you know the factory where the tanks were produced ?
Greetings from Germany !

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