Mishawaka eyes land near Liberty Elementary School for new fire station
MISHAWAKA — Nearly four acres of land in front of Liberty Elementary School are to become the site for the city's new fire station in the next couple of years.
The city is planning to buy the property for $1 from the School City of Mishawaka. The buy-sell agreement will come up on Monday before the Redevelopment Commission.
The $1 sale, however, has a real cost to it. The city will be building a private drive that will serve as a second access point for student drop-offs and pick-ups at the school and to the future fire station at a cost of $900,000.
Add to that the cost of the new fire station that will replace the current small building on North Main Street and the city expects to spend an estimated $14 million on the project.
As it stands, the second drive to the school should help traffic congestion that takes place at the school's current access on Division Street and Pregel Drive.
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In remarks to the commission by Ken Prince, director of planning and community development, construction of this drive will begin this summer. The design for Fire Station No. 2 is still in the planning stages, and he said that portion of the project likely would break ground next year.
The new central station?
A new fire station on McKinley Avenue likely could become the city's central facility, Mayor Dave Wood said in his State of the City address.
Wood said the new station complex will eventually serve as the central station because of the number of calls that are made from points north of the location. The station also could serve as the administrative center and could serve as the home for the city's Survive Alive House.
Also, the city has plans to reconfigure the city's current central station on Union Street as part of a future development project announced when the city in March agreed to buy the former Dodge/RMG Foundry property at 500 S. Union St.
Wood said at the time the central fire station and the roads to and from it would be reconfigured as part of a future project.
He said an expansion would alleviate the limited driveway space where, currently, large fire trucks have to be backed into the station. A pass-through pattern would improve the firefighters' situation, he said.
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The Dodge property project is one the city expects to develop in the future, and city officials said it is planned to be addressed in the next five years.
The new McKinley Avenue fire station would be the first since fire crews moved into the new No. 4 station in January 2013 at Harrison Road and Bennington Drive. The department also has the Douglas Road fire station that was built in 1993.
In a related matter, the city and the school district will consider a memo of understanding to place an electronic reader board sign as part of the fire station-private drive project. The Redevelopment Commission would provide up to $40,000 for the sign to be installed as part of the fire station construction.
The sign is similar to that in front of Mishawaka High School and Twin Branch Elementary School.
Email South Bend Tribune reporter Greg Swiercz at gswiercz@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Mishawaka plans to build fire station near Liberty Elementary School
