Traveling Alberta

The massive stage for a U2 concert at Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton that rose up to 160 feet into the air  was an engineering marvel. It took 108 trucks to transport the stage and production equipment ably assisted by  a crew of hundreds used cranes, booms and lifts to erect four arched, metal spikes — the frame work of a light show leviathan that took four days to build.

Its prongs, levelled with a computer made to build bridges, converge at the structure’s flat top, rivalling the height of Commonwealth Stadium’s nosebleed seats, about 150 feet above the field. The huge structure in a green, reflective skin was adorned with orange lights nicknamed “polyps.” A lit spire atop it all will add yet another 10 feet for the concert.

Edmonton is one of the first North American stops on the third leg of the U2 360° Tour, which began in Barcelona in 2009. The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 210 put around 300 workers on the week long construction job here in Edmonton, which makes it the largest crew the union’s ever committed to a single rock stage.  With more concerts lined up, it is going to busy days ahead for these machine operators and climbers in Alberta who have even sourced  manpower from sister chapters in Calgary and Vancouver to cope  with the heavy workload.