Big contracts keep education hopping

Journal of Business, Mar 08, 2007 by Crompton, Kim

The mechanical-system work was focused last year on the top two levels of the four-level high school, and will center this year on the school's auditorium performing arts center, and gymnasium, Brown says.

Bernardo-Wills Architects PC, of Spokane, is the architect on that project, and Northwestern Construction Inc., of Spokane, is the general contractor.

Meanwhile, Mead School District has two projects under way with a combined total project cost of $50 million.

Lydig Construction Inc., of Spokane, is the general contractor for a new 115,000-square-foot Mead middle school that's being built between Day Mount Spokane Road and Green Bluff Road, just east of US. 2, at a total cost of $33.1 million.

John Dormaier, the district's director of facilities and planning, says work began on the project last fall and is expected to be completed in June 2008.

Northwestern Construction of Washington Inc., of Spokane, is probably about 35 percent complete with the construction of a new 59,000-square-foot elementary school, to be called Prairie View Elementary School, on Five Mile Prairie, Dormaier says. The total cost of that project is $16.9 million, he says.

NAC/Architecture designed both schools.

Gonzaga University

Gonzaga University expects to break ground this spring on the PACCAR Center for Applied Science, which will be constructed just south of the Herak Center for Engineering and will connect to that building via a skywalk.

The total cost of that project is expected to be $7.5 million to $8 million, but PACCAR Inc., a Fortune 200 technology company based in Bellevue, Wash., provided a $2 million gift to Gonzaga that will go toward construction of the building.

The 25,000-square-foot PACCAR Center will house technological laboratories dedicated to robotics, artificial vision, and transmission and distribution engineering, as well as classrooms and faculty offices.

ALSC Architects PS, of Spokane, designed the building, and Hoffman Contractors Inc., of Spokane, which has built a couple of other projects at Gonzaga, will be the general contractor. Gonzaga expects the building to be completed by mid-July 2008.

Separately, the university says it expects to wrap up work this month on a $10.4 million student housing project at the former site of the Colonial Bowl, at the west end of the campus.

The new complex is located on the block bounded by Sharp and Boone avenues and Ruby and Pearl streets and will have 75 three-bedroom apartments on the upper four floors, and a Gonzaga apparel store and a bistro on the ground floor.

This is the second time the apartment complex has been built. The original structure was enclosed and headed toward completion a year ago when a fire destroyed most of it. Gonzaga began rebuilding it soon thereafter. Students are expected to begin moving into the complex in May.

Gonzaga also still is wrapping up work on a new $7 million-plus baseball stadium at the northwest corner of Trent Avenue and Cincinnati Street where a US. Postal Service annex formerly was located, although it's expected to open shortly. Gonzaga bought the property several years ago and tore down the big annex building in 2005.