Norwich
Workers and subcontractors with Wright Construction, of Mount Holly, Vt., on Monday are scheduled to remove asbestos from the old ranch house that served for decades as a police station. The next day, they’ll tear it down.
“I probably won’t shed a tear,” Police Chief Doug Robinson said, leaning back in his chair in the department’s interim headquarters on Tuesday. “It served its purpose, but it served its purpose longer than it should have.”
Robinson and his officers for the meantime are occupying the first floor of a rented house on Route 5 South between King Arthur Flour and the Crossroad Farm stand — a cramped arrangement, he said, but the department is making do.
The Fire Department will remain in place throughout the construction, with the chief’s office moved from the soon-to-be-razed station to the apparatus bay next door.
Despite having hoped for a Thanksgiving move-in, both departments likely will remain in their temporary quarters until January, according to Town Manager Herb Durfee.
“Because of some delays in getting the Is dotted and the Ts crossed that’s probably not likely, so the turkey probably will stay frozen for a few months,” he said.
The $1.29 million contract that the Selectboard signed earlier this month with Wright Construction sets a 220-day deadline, which falls in 2018.
The contract gives the town a cushion for unanticipated expenses, given that voters approved a $1.41 million bond for the project, plus another $70,000 from a later request.
The money will pay for a combined police and fire station off Main Street with a rough gross square footage of 5,900.
Although the existing police station will be demolished, the fire station apparatus bay will remain in place and attach to the new structure designed by Jay White, of Montpelier.
Joe Poston, senior project manager and CFO at Wright Construction, estimated on Wednesday that the job could bring as many as 60 workers to the site.
The company also has contracted to build a structure of a similar size and design for the Okemo Mountain School in Ludlow, Vt., making this project “right up our alley,” he said.
Durfee said municipal officials would be working to minimize the impact on neighbors and travelers as construction happens off of Main Street.
Traffic disruption should be minimal, he said, since most of the equipment should stay on-site. Workers may have to dig up water lines on Firehouse Lane and Hazen Street, but most of that should stay off the town’s main thoroughfare, he said.
In order to address neighbors’ concerns about light and their view of the station, Durfee said, the town has moved the building footprint slightly and removed a few pole lights; it also will contemplate adding foliage shielding once the project is further along.
In August, Wright Construction also is set to begin work on another project in Norwich: renovations to the public works garage off New Boston Road, part of a “design-build” program.
Durfee said town officials hope the roughly $413,000 project would be done no later than Nov. 1, although that schedule would be “really tight,” because Norwich is using money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency that could expire by then.
“It’s very nice,” Selectboard Chairwoman Mary Layton said of the feeling of watching the work go forward after years of planning and wrangling. “I will not completely rest until everything’s done, but it’s nice.”
Layton said she and other town leaders are planning a groundbreaking ceremony, the exact time to be determined, for near the end of next week.
In keeping with the frugal spirit of the fire-police project — one that spurred trimming of the town’s plans from preliminary proposals of up to $7 million down to the final $1.48 million — the celebration will be a simple one, Durfee said: no frills, no specially made commemorative materials, just a “gathering of folks and a shovel stuck in the ground.”
“Hey,” he added of the shovel, “maybe we’ll paint it gold or something like that.”
Rob Wolfe can be reached at rwolfe@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.
Clarification
What was long known as Killdeer Farm Stand on Route 5 in Norwich has changed owners and is now known as Crossroad Farm Stand. An earlier version of this story included an outdated reference to the site.