School is out for now, but while students are at home, work is continuing on the North Vancouver School District’s large school construction projects.
“Construction is viewed as an essential service,” superintendent Mark Pearmain told school trustees at their most recent public meeting, so there’s been no slowdown on the projects.
The school district is still predicting a September 2020 opening for the new $61-million Argyle Secondary. Floors and lighting are now being installed in parts of the new school while drywalling and painting continues in other sections.
The roof is also near completion and preparations are in progress for the sidewalks, landscaping, and parking lot.
The original budget for the school when it was announced in 2016 was just over $49 million. But costs ballooned in the interim and the province later agreed to kick in more funding.
Demolition of the old Argyle school is also set to begin in the fall of 2020.
Meanwhile, work on a second rebuild – the new $68.7-million Handsworth Secondary – has also started.
Bulk excavation is complete, with detailed excavation in progress in preparation for a foundation concrete pour, said Lisa Della Vecchia, spokeswoman for the school district.
Trustees marked the start of that project during a ground-breaking ceremony in March and steel is expected to rise from the site of the new school this summer.
In January, the school district reached an agreement with Ventana Construction on a $56.1-million fixed-price build contract for the new school.
The project is also beginning $6 million over its original budget of $62.3 million and will be finished a year beyond its original completion date after escalating project costs resulted in a delay last year.
The new Handsworth school will be 139,931 square feet - a reduction of 13,239 square feet from its current footprint. While Handsworth's current enrolment is 1,471, the new school will have a capacity of 1,400.
Work on the seismic mitigation project to bring Mountainside Secondary up to earthquake standards has also continued this spring while students aren’t attending school.
Concrete buttresses are being built and entire floors inside the school have been taken out while construction accelerates, said Pearmain.
Completion of that project is expected by the fall of 2021.
