ESBC Narrows Center School Site Options to 4 Finalists

Over the coming weeks, the ESBC will perform additional due diligence of the following site alternatives (the short list):

– Center School: Alternative 1C + 25 Ash Street, consisting of new construction on town owned property behind existing school, augmented by abutting 25 Ash Street, with preservation of the front of existing Center School building.
– Irvine Property: Just South of Hopkinton Parks & Recreation land at EMC Park.
– Todaro Property: Adjacent to Water Fresh Farm and abutting 5 acres of town owned property on the South.

The committee’s decision followed extensive deliberations and discussion over the course of several meetings, including input from two community workshops, and consideration of expert advice from town and school district professional staff, Compass Project Management, and Drummey, Rosane, Anderson (DRA) architects. Flexibility for future growth, minimizing disruption to education during construction, and other factors in the published site evaluation matrix (http://tinyurl.com/siteevalmatrix) weighed heavily in deciding the short-listed sites.

What’s next? Through the remainder of February and early March, the ESBC and its partners, Compass Project Management and DRA, will complete additional due diligence of the short listed sites. The community is invited to the third community workshop to review results of this additional work, Saturday, March 7, 9:00 – 10:30 AM at the Center School.

The ESBC expects to make a final decision on a preferred site by March 16th, 2015. As always, please send feedback and questions to schoolproject@hopkintonma.gov!

Additional resources:

• Hopkinton Independent article on community forum regarding site selections
• ESBC Site Evaluation Matrix
  
• Hopkinton School Building Project Facebook page