An elevator removed from the new West Elementary School construction project last spring will be included when the building opens next fall.
The West Elementary School and Shawsheen Preschool Building Committee unanimously approved a change order Tuesday for $323,000 to include the elevator, which was removed from the design when the project went over budget. The money will come from the project’s construction contingency fund and will not raise the total cost of the $168 million school.
“It was a very hard thing to take out,” school committee member Susan McCready said. “So I know that I was happy, and I think everybody was happy to be able to support and put that back into the project for our students and staff.”
When the project first went over budget last summer, the West El building committee closed a $5.5 million budget gap by making about 25 changes to the design, including the “difficult decision” of removing one of the schools’ two elevators. The committee kept the elevator shaft in the design, leaving the option to add the elevator at a later date.
Already one of the most expensive public elementary school construction project in Massachusetts history with construction costs of $624 per square foot, West El’s total price tag rose from the original, $151.6 million after Special Town Meeting approved money for budget overruns in December.
File photo.