Early Concepts Emerge For Town Campus

ORLEANS – While details and specifics still need sorting out, town officials last week got a better picture of what a town campus might ultimately look like on Eldredge Park Way.
 
Ted Galante of Galante Architecture Studio in Cambridge gave the select board and Orleans Elementary School committee a first look at what a new fire station, elementary school and community center might look like as part of the new campus on land currently occupied by the existing fire station and school.
 
Town meeting voters in May approved using $150,000 in free cash to fund a feasibility study looking at options for the campus. With available town land in short supply, the campus concept is being explored as an attempt to site all three projects together in one location.
 
Galante has been meeting weekly with a town working group to look at options for each building. The fire station opened in 1987 but no longer meets the needs of a modern day fire facility. The original portion of the elementary school dates back to 1956, and needed repairs to the building could trigger a state requirement to bring the entire aging building up to code. There has also been vocal support for building a new community center in town.
 
In his presentation to the select board and school committee Feb. 25, Galante outlined the tentative square footage for each building as well as some very preliminary schematics of how the buildings might be designed. He walked the boards through “program books” for each project that itemize each building’s needs, as well as the rough square footage for each room inside.
 
“These are not final designs,” he said. “They’re establishing the criteria so we can design the building.”
 
Galante is expected to have a final report with recommendations for each building ready for the boards to review in April. In May, a request for $45 million to design and construct a new fire station in approximately the same area as the existing station is expected to go before voters at the annual town meeting.
 
The fire station schematic presented last week showed a building approximately 40,000 square feet in size. The two-story building included a kitchen and living space on the first floor and room for administrative offices and staff training on the second. Galante said the bottom of the property fronting Eldredge Park Way is the most ideal location for the new station.
 The early schematic of the site also includes a lengthy easement that would directly link the property to Route 6A. Galante said the easement is about 14 to 15 feet in width, wide enough to accommodate vehicle traffic. But he said he did not envision the easement for use as a primary entrance or exit for the fire station. Select Board member Kevin Galligan, however, said that the easement would give the property a direct line through which to connect to town sewer.
 
The new station would take anywhere from 24 to 36 months to complete from design through to construction, Galante said. But Orleans resident Ken Heritage raised questions about how much the project will ultimately cost in the end. His estimate is that the project will cost closer to $50 million, and he expressed concern about the potential for sticker shock among some voters in May.
 
“I think we need to be very careful about what we throw out here so we don’t hurt ourselves in the end,” he said.
 
A new elementary school is envisioned to be approximately 60,000 square feet, according to early figures. Galante presented options for both a one- and two-story school.
 
“We need to think about a two-story school, because we only have so much real estate on Eldredge Park Way,” he said.
 
The one-story concept showed a number of pod-like buildings built off of a long corridor. That concept also includes potential space for after school programming with its own entrance. Citing the design of the new housing development on 107 Main St., which is composed of prefabricated dwellings trucked in from out of state, Galligan asked if the same modular approach to construction could work for a new elementary school.
 
“There’s a whole lot of benefits to modular design, yes,” Galante said.

 Select Board member Michael Herman praised the school concepts as presented last week and stressed the importance of building a new school to be energy efficient. Fellow select board member Andrea Reed, meanwhile, said a building that effectively uses natural light and the outdoors is also important from a mental health standpoint, especially coming out of the pandemic.

 “I would just beg you to proceed with those considerations as well, because we want places that people love to be in,” she said.

 For Sassandra Roche of the elementary school committee, staff and student safety was top of mind. That includes regulating who has access to school property and when. Galante said safety will be seriously considered as planning progresses and details for the new school come into focus.

 Galante said preliminary estimates figure anywhere between 150 and 230 students for the new school. But with three new housing developments in the pipeline, including two that are near completion, elementary school committee chair Gail Briere wondered how they might boost student enrollment at OES.

 “I’m hoping we’re going to see more families joining our community,” she said.

 Regarding the community center, Herman said construction of a flexible space that can accommodate different uses will be key. Early numbers presented last week called for 38,000 square feet of space for community programming. That could eventually include space for a new council on aging if necessary, Herman said.

 “Nobody’s saying it won’t stay forever where it is (on Rock Harbor Road),” he said. “But we are busting at the seams right now, and as it continues to grow, I don’t want to leave this to the next people sitting behind this dais in 10 years to say ‘We need a new COA, and we’ve got nowhere to put it.”

 “It’s just so important to me that the whole community is together,” Roche said of the community center planning.

 While the fire station is on the front burner for design and construction, the other projects will be phased in over time. But select board and school committee members said with the need for new buildings and the cost that comes with waiting, the town shouldn’t stretch the projects too far out into the future.

 “I know there’s some phasing that has to happen here, but there also needs to be clear timelines on the funding,” said Ian Mack of the school committee.

 But while there’s still much to work out in the way of details, Briere said after the meeting that there is a greater sense of togetherness between the school committee, the select board and the fire department in planning for the new facilities than there was in past efforts to site a new school and fire station.
 
“I mean, we all live in this community,” she said. “We want this to work.”
 
 Email Ryan Bray at ryan@capecodchronicle.com