The architects will present three design schemes Tuesday night.
By: Jeff Milgram
The Princeton Regional Board of Education will get a look at three school expansion and renovation options tonight at a special meeting at the John Witherspoon School.
The meeting is scheduled to start at 8 p.m.
The board also expects to report on the financial effect of the receiving relationship that sends 171 students from Cranbury to Princeton High School, school board President Charlotte Bialek said Monday.
And members of the board say they hope the community will turn out to see the options.
"We do hope lots of people will show up," said Frank Strasburger, vice president of the school board and chairman of the board’s Facilities Committee.
"We expect a lot of comment," Ms. Bialek said.
Architects from The Hillier Group will present the three plans to the board. The board will take no formal action tonight, but Ms. Bialek said it might be possible to tell which way the board is leaning.
"We wanted to give the full board a range of options," the Rev. Strasburger said Monday. "No one should make assumptions that we favor one plan over another."
The Facilities Committee will meet Dec. 7 and will rank the options, the Rev. Strasburger said.
The full board will vote on an option at a special meeting scheduled for Dec. 12, Ms. Bialek said. The option that is approved will be included in the district’s five-year long-range facilities plan, which must be submitted to the state by Dec. 15.
All three options include renovating and expanding Princeton High School by building additions for arts, fitness and science and technology centers.
The first option would include expanding the John Witherspoon School, which is located across Walnut Lane from PHS. The Witherspoon School, the district’s middle school, would get an indoor swimming pool as part of a "wellness center."
The Rev. Strasburger called the first option "far and away the least expensive."
The remaining options call for tearing down the Witherspoon School, which was built more than 30 years ago as an elementary school.
The second option calls for building a new middle school near Franklin Avenue, across Walnut Lane from PHS. The third option calls for building a new middle school next to the expanded high school.
Building a new middle school will add $20 million to the base cost of the expansion project, said David N. Hingston, a senior associate at Hillier.
Mr. Hingston said tonight’s presentation will include the location for parking and playing fields for each option, but may not include a price estimate.
"I don’t know yet," said Mr. Hingston on Monday, when asked how much the project will cost. "I really don’t know. I hope we will have some comparative numbers."
The Rev. Strasburger expects the price tag will be high, in part because the district delayed the expansion project for so long.
"It’s going to be expensive," he said. "We’re going to look for ways to keep the costs within reason.
"Cost is very much on our minds," the Rev. Strasburger added. "I think finding the plan that is the least expensive – if it accomplishes what we want it to do – will be very compelling."
Ms. Bialek said the options that call for the construction of a new middle school quickly solve the problem of what to do with students while PHS is being renovated. She called them "very expensive options."
"Cost is definitely going to be a factor," she said.
But time becomes increasingly important if New Jersey turns into a "rich market for construction" because of the $8.5 billion in state school construction aid that is now available, Ms. Bialek said.
And, if it is true – as she said she has been told – that construction costs are increasing between 1 and 1.5 percent a month, a year’s delay of a $10 million project could tack on an additional $1.5 million.
"It means we have to plan very quickly," she said.