Construction progressing on Westminster town hall site
By Caitlyn Kelleher

Westminster's new Town Hall.

Construction at the new town hall is progressing quickly and should be ready for operations in November, said Clerk of the Works Duffy Lanciani.

The exterior work on the building should be completed by the end of August and the work on the interior and the site will take through the fall.

"The mechanical trades anticipate being done sometime next week, so then we can begin sheet rocking," Lanciani said.

Construction on the building began in September 2005 and was expected to take 11 months. But, Lanciani said delays at the beginning of the project meant that the timeline had to be extended.

He said constructing the steal frame took longer then predicted because of winter weather conditions and the timing of the different construction crews required to do the work.

He also said the only significant change to the project was the underground footings.

"It was anticipated," Lanciani said. "Once they started digging that is when they

knew what they needed to do."

Other than that very little has changed from the design that voters approved $5.2 million for. Lanciani said the only real changes orders have been moving electrical outlets a couple of feet or inches.

As the fall approaches the building will be all closed in, so weather delays should not effect the progress. The remaining exterior work will be the water and sewer connections, as well as the paving and the gardening.

"The masonry is supposed to be done this week," Lanciani said. "The roofer should be done next week probably."

The construction site will be cleaned up after that because the need to store materials will be done. The materials should be gone by the end of August, he said.

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Caitlyn Kelleher can be reached at (978) 827-3386, ext. 15, or e-mail: caitlynkelleher@ aol.com