{"id":31324,"date":"2022-05-19T17:56:17","date_gmt":"2022-05-19T21:56:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=31324"},"modified":"2022-05-19T18:06:16","modified_gmt":"2022-05-19T22:06:16","slug":"first-components-of-town-square-project-to-open-in-a-few-weeks-following-delays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/first-components-of-town-square-project-to-open-in-a-few-weeks-following-delays\/","title":{"rendered":"First components of Town Square project to open \u201cin a few weeks\u201d following delays"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The first phase of Aurora\u2019s Town Square project \u2013 a new Yonge Street entrance for the Aurora Public Library \u2013 is expected to open \u201cin a few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Aurora Public Library\u2019s (APL) new ground floor, designed to maximize accessibility from its Yonge Street frontage, was expected to open in April, but delays on multiple fronts have pushed the grand opening to \u201ca few weeks\u201d from now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Members of the Town\u2019s Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) \u2013 Mayor Tom Mrakas and Councillors Harold Kim and Michael Thompson \u2013 received an update on Town Square and other capital projects at a meeting last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the report prepared for FAC by Town staff, March and April were busy months for Town Square construction with work continuing on the new APL reading garden, the third floor of the Aurora Cultural Centre\/Church Street School expansion being poured, and engineers have been brought on to \u201cundertake an independent structural investigation of the existing school house in response to preliminary results of crack monitoring testing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The report notes that 124 change orders on the Town Square construction have been approved to date, with a value of $1.586 million, including nearly $20,000 for exterior signage, additional ceiling demolition at the APL ($92,439), and $39,600 for parapet details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cColliers continues to note the Budget status as \u2018Yellow\u2019 in this reporting period (March and April) indicating a moderate risk to the project outcome,\u201d said the report. \u201cThis is based on the approved\/pending forecasted Change Orders accumulating at a quicker pace than base construction works. Colliers anticipates that the progression of changes should slow as the construction works progress, however current market conditions continue to create volatile material and labour pricing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the FAC meeting, Town Treasurer Rachel Wainwright-Van Kessel said it was the intention to have the Library turned over at the end of April, but factors in the delay included material sourcing due to the global pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re waiting for an updated schedule and expecting the Library to turn over in the next few weeks,\u201d she said. \u201cThere are some challenges. There is the carpenter\u2019s strike that is happening, so we\u2019re monitoring that closely to see if that is going to have any impacts on the overall project as well. This time, substantial completion is forecast for the Winter of 2023 and completion in Spring of 2023.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the subject of the Budget being in \u201cYellow\u201d status, Ms. Wainwright-Van Kessell said the report does not indicate it is going to go over-budget \u201cat this time, but we are saying there are some risks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe biggest risk is material shortages and changes resulting from COVID-19,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a bit of a challenge, particularly in the construction industry at this time, so we\u2019re managing it closely and we\u2019re also making sure we manage the contingency appropriately to hopefully stay within the budget on this project.\u201d
Mayor Mrakas noted it was hoped the first components of the revamped Library would be open to the public \u201cat the end of May.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additional updates to the Town\u2019s ongoing capital projects included an updated timeline on when the new Central York Fire Services station and headquarters on Earl Stewart Drive, in the southwest quadrant of Bayview Avenue and St. John\u2019s Sideroad, could be largely completed by this Tuesday, May 24.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe work on the fire hall is progressing nicely,\u201d said Ms. Wainwright-Van Kessell. \u201cIt is\u2026definitely starting to take shape and I believe the boards (around the fencing) should be down sometime soon. We\u2019re looking for when that happens. The project schedule is showing that we\u2019re expecting completion for occupancy on May 24, substantial performance at the end of the month, and total completion by June 18. That should not delay anything from Fire\u2019s perspective of being able to do their hiring and take control of the facility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt this time, we are still expecting to stay within the budget and that\u2019s where we\u2019re at right now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first phase of Aurora\u2019s Town Square project \u2013 a new Yonge Street entrance for the Aurora Public Library \u2013 is expected to open \u201cin a few weeks.\u201d The Aurora Public Library\u2019s (APL) new ground floor, designed to maximize accessibility from its Yonge Street frontage, was expected to open in April, but delays on multiple […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-89e","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-14 12:40:16","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31324\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}