Campus Construction Update, July 1, 2022

Associate Vice Chancellor for Finance and Operations Matt Dull chats with University Communications' Dave Blanks about the construction progress for App State's New River Hall and shares Child Development Center updates.

Transcript

Dave Blanks: Hey folks, this is Dave, and I'm here with Matt. Hello, Matt.

Matt Dull: Hello, hello.

Dave Blanks: Everybody can read our last name, so we can just be on a first name basis with everybody, right? That works. Today we're talking about New River Hall. Many a shrub has been planted.

Matt Dull: Many a shrub and tree and everything has been planted the past couple weeks.

Dave Blanks: Yep. And there's this raised walkway and it's partially finished.

Matt Dull: But they're hoping to wrap it up this week.

Dave Blanks: Okay.

Matt Dull: Weather dependent. And then if not, beginning of next week. But should really wrap up here in the next couple of days.

Dave Blanks: What else has happened in there? The stairs are in. You have the perfect idea of how that'll look because it looks how it's going to look.

Matt Dull: Yeah. Yeah, stairs are in. All the little areas where the pavers are, both in the front of the building and the courtyard in the back, they're all in.

Dave Blanks: The Sternbergs.

Matt Dull: The Sternberg lights are going in. They should be wrapping up here in the next week or so.

Dave Blanks: Right. The cobra heads.

Matt Dull: The cobra head lights in the parking lot are in.

Dave Blanks: Yep.

Matt Dull: The trash-pactor. Trash compactor.

Dave Blanks: I like it.

Matt Dull: Trash compactor.

Dave Blanks: No, brevity is the name of the game, the trash-pactor.

Matt Dull: But yeah, the trash compactor corral. Say that five times. That's being wrapped up. Rock is being laid on the outside of that. Papers are in. The outdoor picnic tables that are in the courtyard area, those are in and installed. That raised crosswalk you talked about, that's getting finished up here. So, exterior work is wrapping up here in the next week to two weeks, really. They will go in as a last thing once all the landscaping done, once any heavy equipment's done.

Matt Dull: The construction trailer is coming out here in the next week or two. Once all that gets out, they'll do a final top coat on all of the asphalt. So, what's on there now is a base layer that we wanted to not put that final wear layer or final top layer on the asphalt until everything's really out and we're not going to mess it up. So, that'll be the last thing. They'll pave their way out there and then restripe that parking lot and repave the lower parking lot down at the Garwood Hall. I keep wanting to say CAP building.

Dave Blanks: I know.

Matt Dull: Garwood Hall. And yeah, so they'll pave their way and stripe their way out. And yeah, the exterior will wrap up here in the next couple of weeks. Inside the building, the next week ahead includes a final clean of the student units. Pretty much all of the punch list work is done there. They're substantially complete.

Matt Dull: So, just doing that last little bit of cleanup to make sure that there's no little drywall dust or paint splotches or whatever that's hit the flooring in there and get everything really ready for students to move in here. In about six or seven weeks now, students will be moving into the building.

Matt Dull: And let's see. Furniture installation, that started last week and will continue for the next couple of weeks, along with mattresses will go in here in the next few weeks. Laundry machines are going into the building right now, so getting those in place. So yeah, final punch really throughout the building is really the phase you're in of just getting the last little bits of interior work finished up and...

Dave Blanks: They don't have individual washer and dryer. They still do like a shared area, right?

Matt Dull: Yeah, there's a single-

Dave Blanks: They don't have it that good.

Matt Dull: Yeah, yeah. There's a single laundry room for the whole building.

Dave Blanks: For the whole building or for each floor?

Matt Dull: For the whole building, so it is huge. It's got 30 or 32 washers and 30 or 32 dryers in that room. It's a rather large facility. And there's an app on their phone they can go in and see when machines are available from their room or wherever they are. And they can see when their laundry gets done on their specific machine. When they got it in the washer, they can see when it gets done and know when to go switch the laundry or go pick it up and bring it back.

Dave Blanks: This world we're living in.

Matt Dull: Just trying to make it as convenient as possible by being centralized.

Dave Blanks: But they don't get to hypnotically stare at the machine to wait and watch. Right?

Matt Dull: That's right.

Dave Blanks: They're going to miss out on all that time where they can come up with all their cool creative ideas. What are they going to be doing?

Matt Dull: I mean, I guess you could still do that, but...

Dave Blanks: You could. You'd be the lone weirdo.

Matt Dull: That's right. There's now a way to avoid that.

Dave Blanks: All right. What else do we want to cover today? So, the punch list stuff's done. The exterior stuff is like really looking good and wrapping up.

Matt Dull: Yeah, should get the elevator final inspection I think next week. And then really shooting for a certificate of occupancy, which is really that last, hey, this is a safe and appropriate building for people to be living in and occupying all the time, in about three weeks. We're about three weeks out from the certificate of occupancy. And that'll give us about two to three weeks before our RAs move into the building, and then the students will move in right after that.

Dave Blanks: Cool. Are we going to have a ceremony like we've done with the other ones, like a little bit of a ribbon cutting?

Matt Dull: Yeah, there'll be a ribbon cutting. I'll have to get the date. I think that we were still working on when that date is.

Dave Blanks: Sometime in the next seven weeks.

Matt Dull: Yeah, sometime very soon.

Dave Blanks: Yeah. Right. Cool.

Matt Dull: Yeah.

Dave Blanks: Well, looking forward to it, Matt. What else can we talk about? My word.

Matt Dull: Let's see. So, Eggers and Bowie, we continue to do abatement on both of those buildings. Work continues there. I think if people look at the building from the outside, it's like, well, what's going on there? They're just sitting empty. But they're actually working in the interior of the building, getting it ready to be able to start doing the demolition, which we'll start seeing more that exterior demolition on Bowie Hall first here in the next month or so. So, as students here are coming back, that demolition should have started or what you see is visible from the outside should started by that August when students come back.

Dave Blanks: Cool.

Matt Dull: Things still moving there. We haven't talked about the Child Development Center expansion in a while.

Dave Blanks: Let's talk about that.

Matt Dull: We could jump there real quick.

Dave Blanks: We'll finish up with that if that sounds good.

Matt Dull: Yeah, sounds good. Yeah.

Dave Blanks: Cool.

Matt Dull: So, interior of the Child Development Center is really substantially complete. So, furniture is in the building. The team is working on really getting that set up right now, so setting up the classrooms. And so, we've got our teachers in there and setting up their classrooms. And classrooms have really got to be set up to how they're going to look for children before we can be inspected by that local health department as well as the state licensing agency. So, you have to be licensed and approved as a childcare site in North Carolina.

Matt Dull: And so, that's really the phase we're moving into now is getting everything... interior the building set up so it can be licensed. So, that's going to be really those setting up the rooms and getting the licensing approvals will be over the next month, month-and-a-half or so, so that we can really open up for this fall to have kids in the center to have those additional 55 spaces open.

Matt Dull: Let's see. The past few weeks, have been working on concrete work for the sidewalks, curb and gutter. And then pavement's going in right now at the center to get it really finished off and ready to go. Super excited to have the pavement in and the parking spaces striped and really getting everything ready for parents to be able to do the drop off and pick up for kids. So, it's been a mess for a few months. So, I know our-

Dave Blanks: And they haven't stopped serving families.

Matt Dull: No, it's been open the whole time. So, our families have been super accommodating of all of the mess that's over there, but we'll be really excited to have the paving done. Clean up a lot of the mess so that pick up and drop off for the children in the existing center can get back to normal here in the next week or so. And then we'll be really ready for the fall of having more kids and families there. Playground area and landscaping will start next week once that paving's complete. That'll be that last phase of the exterior work.

Dave Blanks: New playground stuff?

Matt Dull: Yes, new playground stuff.

Dave Blanks: Cool.

Matt Dull: And doing some things, like some simple things of even having some undulating places in the playground where we can do little paved strips where kids can ride their bike and actually have a little different terrain. Yeah, like a little pump course or whatever.

Dave Blanks: Yeah, cool. Yeah.

Matt Dull: Pump track. So, a much smaller scale, but just trying to do some things that keeps it interested and playing in the playground and using different toys. So, let's see. That's happening. Wrapping up that connector between the new and old building. That'll happen or finish up in the next week or so.

Matt Dull: So, really construction over there really should wrap up the first, second week of July. And then that-

Dave Blanks: Wow, yeah, that's like...

Matt Dull: That's really soon coming up. It's here. And then, yeah, just really focusing in on getting those classrooms set up so they can be in inspected here in July so we can get classrooms open for fall.

Dave Blanks: Cool. Matt Dull, you've been very informative as always. I appreciate your presence, and we will do it again.

Matt Dull: Sounds good. See you soon.