Demolition of the old New Westminster Secondary School is about to get underway at last — but don’t expect to see any walls coming down for months yet.
Residents living near the old school should soon see construction fencing going up around the perimeter — though the school district’s director of facilities, Dave Crowe, told trustees at their June 7 operations committee meeting that the district is struggling to get enough fencing to contain the site for demolition.
Demolition work will begin with the Pearson wing, on the Eighth Street/10th Avenue side of the property. Remediation work — including removing hazardous materials such as asbestos — will be the first step. Crowe said there will be a “huge amount” of that before any physical demolition begins, so it will be several months before people will see any physical demolition of the building.
“It’s exciting to know that the project is finally getting out of the gate,” he said.
Crowe said the district is already setting out plans to cope with one of the biggest challenges associated with the site: parking.
With the new NWSS, Massey Theatre and Mercer Stadium all sharing parking for the site, he said the project team is working hard to minimize the loss of parking spaces.
“Needless to say, in a project of this size and magnitude, there’s going to be times when the parking will be impacted on the site,” he said. “I can assure you we’re doing everything in our power to minimize the impact.”
Part of the planning is working to coordinate schedules to avoid the “perfect storm” of all three sites having major events at the same time.
“I think it’s fair to say that there will be impacts. We’re asking for patience and to help us get this job done,” Crowe said.
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