The best bid the City of Wilmington received for the construction of a new fire station on Cinema Drive–in a plan to replace stations elsewhere–is $753,000 more than initially programmed.
Montieth Construction of Wilmington proposed a $3.37-million job, the lowest among four responsible bidders, Wilmington Fire Chief Buddy Martinette said Tuesday.
But the $2.65-million figure initially programmed was a 2006 estimate, Martinette said, so the bid from Montieth wasn’t entirely startling.
“Keep in mind this particular facility is replacing two other facilities,” he added.
City staffers are expected to present some funding strategies for the Cinema Drive station at Wilmington City Council’s Aug. 5 meeting.
Council could award the contract that night.
The city manager’s office received authority to purchase land for the station in August 2012; it’s directly across from the Carmike 16 movie theater parking lot. Cinema Drive is a short connector between Market Street and Kerr Avenue.
The land’s cost was $729,015.
The station’s base design–with input from fire fighters and city council members–covers more than 14,500 square feet. An additional bay and sleeping quarters are desired for equipment and personnel expectations.
When online, it would prompt the closure of the fire stations on Princess Place and Wallace drives in a plan to reduce the number of city stations from 11 to 9.
The city would also open a new station on Shipyard Boulevard near the Carolina Beach Road intersection (on land the city bought for $641,023). It would replace stations on Wellington Avenue and Carolina Beach Road.
A memo to council last year explained the reduction involved strategic locations for new stations that would allow the city to meet needs and response-time benchmarks all the same, generally.
Martinette on Tuesday also noted another “reason to celebrate.”
He said the oldest stations in town date back as far as 42 years. After the four marked for closure make way for the new additions, the oldest in town would date to 1999.
“That is a tremendous commitment on behalf of [Wilmington’s] citizens to provide our firefighters with modern, up-to-date, great facilities from which to operate from,” the chief said.
The Cinema Drive plan would also require traffic signals at each end of the street, at Market Street and at Kerr Avenue. The red-yellow-green signals would link with the 911 system and green-light in favor of fire trucks responding to emergency calls.
