Wheaton High Schools
Renovation Work Done During Breaks
by Elaine Schmidt

Working on renovations and additions at functioning schools is a lot like performing comedy - it's all in the timing.

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Wheaton Warrenville School District 200 is in the middle of an addition/renovation project that is expanding and renovating both the Wheaton North High School and the Wheaton Warrenville South High School. Bovis Lend Lease is the construction manager for the $72 million project.

The 295,000-sq.-ft. Wheaton Warrenville South High School is getting a 155,000-sq.-ft. addition, as well as a renovation of 60,000 sq. ft. of existing space. The 234,000-sq.-ft. Wheaton North High School is getting an additional 160,000 sq. ft. and a renovation of 20,000 sq. ft. of existing space.

"South is getting a little more work on this project because Wheaton North had some work done a couple of years ago," said Steve Gromala, Bovis' senior project manager on the project at South. He explained that the district has always striven to keep the two high schools' facilities comparable and keep all expansions and renovations equitable.

Both schools are getting new fine arts areas, including band and orchestra rooms, practice rooms and storage facilities. The schools are also getting new classrooms, commons areas, administration offices and new field houses.

Work began in April, but preliminary sitework started in October 2003.

Wheaton North is scheduled for completion in spring 2006, followed by Wheaton Warrenville South in the fall of the same year.

"With our sitework we tried to get everything ready for the spring start, which was part of tailoring the project to do interior work when they are all off from school," Gromala said.

He called the interior renovations "intrusive" and added, "Last summer we took apart the entire mechanical room [at South] and had it back in business for school in the fall."

Breaking the Project

Jeannine Eicker, Bovis' senior project manager on the Wheaton North building, said that there are just three windows for interior construction in each year's school schedule: Christmas break, spring break and summer break.

She added: "The summer is really only about an eight-week window," and it takes a little time for the school to get the areas to be renovated cleared out and ready for work. On the other end of the summer it takes a few days to get the areas back in working order before faculty gets into the spaces to prepare for the students' return.

These windows in the year's schedule, and the presence of portable classroom units, dubbed "trailer parks" by the students, have led to two carefully sequenced construction plans - one for each school.

"We had to build the South classrooms and the North field house first," said Bill Farley, the district's superintendent for business operations. On the South project the portables were in the footprint of the new field house, which meant the classroom addition had to be completed before the portables removed to being work on the field house.

On the North structure, the portables are in the footprint of the new classrooms, so work on the field house came first. Work will begin on the new classrooms next spring, with a huge push during the summer to get the new classrooms ready for fall. Farley said Bovis is working closely with the school district to get into some spaces before school is out for summer and finish up in some spaces after school has started.

Additional scheduling headaches occurred on the North high school because of some hybrid construction.

"We have structural steel, masonry bearing walls and structural precast walls in the field house, and the architectural precast walls fasten onto the structural steel," Eicker said. As a result, a lot of the work has had to be carefully sequenced and trades closely coordinated.

"It's really challenging because it is not like you can have each activity go on continuously until it is done and then begin the next one," she added. "The trades have to trade off and work intermittently, working and then getting out of each other's way."

Wheaton Two Step

Part of the trick to making the schedule work on a two-school, phased-construction project was bidding it out as two separate projects, ensuring that a contractor working on both schools would treat them like separate jobs with independent schedules and deadlines.

"All the trades know we bought the work as two separate contracts," Gromala said. "We want two separate foremen - no bouncing back and forth."

He added that the in some cases, the bulk of a contractor's work will be at one school or the other at any given time, which means that having a single foreman covering both jobs may work out. The schools share HVAC, masonry, concrete, painting and flooring contractors.

"If we think we are getting into a crunch, we can say they owe us two foremen," he said, adding that the slow economy led to quite a bit of competition for contracts on the job. "Most contractors were agreeable to staffing up when we need it."

The scope of the construction work at both schools has effectively engulfed both buildings, making student and staff egress and safety major concerns.

"We are working around high schools, which means students driving like maniacs - especially when they are late," Eicker said. "It's in the contract that no construction traffic is allowed outside the fence at hours when students are arriving or departing."

Early deliveries either have to get in by 6:30 or wait at a gas station down the road.

Constructing on all sides of the two buildings has taken some entrances out of service.

"We have had to provide emergency exits," Eicker said. "Providing a safe means of egress is always a challenge. Before we put any of those in place we review them with the school and fire department and regional office of education. Once the exits are established, we walk through it again and show them all where they are."

Fire drills have helped familiarize the students with exits as well.

"Being a parent, I look at it and ask if I would feel safe having my kid in this space," Eicker said.

One of the project's biggest hurdles occurred just days before the project went out to bid when John Sluis, the district's executive director of facilities, passed away suddenly.

"John had done all the legwork on the project and gotten the referendum passed, Farley said. "He had worked long and hard on the scope and design of the project. It was a real hardship losing him."

Farley said the district relied heavily on Bovis and the project designer to get through the bid process.