Snowstorm had little impact on project.
By: Jennifer Potash
The big holiday weekend snowstorm may have been one for the books but it didn’t slow down the Princeton Public Library construction project.
Eric Greenfeldt, assistant library director, said Tuesday at a library trustees meeting that the contractor, Turner Construction Group, planned to remove the snow from the building site at the corner of Witherspoon and Wiggins streets.
"It’s a big soupy mess down there," he said.
The key sewer work on the site was slated to be completed on time, he said.
Delays with the construction bid and environmental cleanup at the site pushed back the building completion from December 2003 to Feb. 24, 2004 "plus or minus six hours," quipped Harry Levine, chairman of the library trustees.
That February date still holds and the library is working with Turner to try to cut the schedule some more in the spring, Mr. Greenfeldt said.
Some of the concrete slab work was pushed back because the frozen ground, as hard as concrete, limited the workers’ efforts, Mr. Greenfeldt said.
Problems are to be expected during any construction project, Mr. Levine said, noting the library was recently informed of a very complex problem with the utility services to the new library.
A survey of the utilities near the site failed to find a large concrete wall under Witherspoon Street, which caused problems for the wiring plan to service the building, Mr. Levine said. The library will work with Princeton Borough, PSE&G and the other utility companies to solve the problem, he said.

