Lanesborough Police Station Site Needs Geotechnical Survey
LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — A request that the town transfer $40,000 from the stabilization fund so the town can retain services from Jacunski Humes Architects will be added to the town meeting warrant for June 13.
The Select Board approved adding this request to the warrant during its meeting on May 30, Public Safety Building Committee chair Mark Siegars said during its meeting last week.
"It just takes a vote to take it out and let us finish this work so we are not asking them to raise and appropriate the taxes. It's just money that's sitting in a savings account for the purposes of the police station," Siegars said.
The town has already allocated $108,000 in stabilization funds for the police station so the approval of this warrant article would not impact the tax rate, he said.
The proposed location for the public safety building, Skyline Country Club, will need geotechnical engineering to determine if it is a suitable building, said Brian Humes, principal of Jacunski Humes Architects.
The geotechnical engineering takes three borings at the locations across the site. The test costs $7,500 to do the borings and to prepare a report, Humes said.
"Quite frankly, if it turns out we can build the building there then we got to start thinking about something completely different. I don't suspect that we won't be able to put a building in there, may just take deeper footings," Siegars said.
"But I think that's really an important question and the town does own the real estate, the ARPA funds have already been allocated to the boring tests. So the town doesn't have to spend any money that hasn't already been allocated for it."
After the completion of the boring tests, there is $7,900 left after that for design work, Siegars said.
The test tells the structural engineer what to anticipate for footing and foundation and if the soil is unsuitable for building and needs to be removed.
"The reason that I recommended that this be done on the Skyline site is it's pretty evident that there's been an area of fill on the lower section of what was the driving range. You can see some elevated ground elevations that leveled off where the driving range was," Humes said.
Although the site will fit the building work, Humes concern is that they are not sure what the conditions of the fill material is and what was brought in to make the site level.
The test needs to be conducted prior to building because if something degradable, like tree stumps, was used as fill then over time it would decay and the land would start to settle.
"If they filled it with great structural fill and topsoil it can withstand normal footings and foundations," Humes said.
If it is determined that the soil is unsuitable that does not mean the site can’t be developed there it just means the fill would have to be removed and replaced with something new which would impact the cost of the development, he said.
The geotechnical engineer would need about two weeks notice but they are still available to go to the site and complete testing. The engineer sent insurance certificates to the town naming Lanesborough as an additional insurer within their insurance certificate, Humes said.
Tags: Lanesborough Police Station, town meeting 2023,
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