New Administration Building

By Laura Thomas




Back in December I got a phone call from my friend and owner of Prairie Fire Sprinkler asking me if I wanted a job attending meetings and taking weekly progress photos of the job site for the new Administration Building. Bottom line is PFS is located in Decatur, IL and having to drive 3 - 3.5 hours each way for a 1 hour meeting was going to blow an entire day and gas itself would be $60 or more. Needless to say, I was a bargain for time and money to their company We met for lunch, discussed the project, agreed on a price and I've been going to meetings since February.

Thanks to the very mild winter, demolition went exceedingly well and ahead of schedule. Contractors were supposed to be mobilized on site March 1st to begin construction. Construction being what it is and deadlines pushed back for many reasons, construction was not able to start until 3-29-2012. This made the gained month obsolete but they are still on schedule for its completion.
They are currently excavating and removing over 140 truckloads of dirt every day from the job site to begin setting the piers. Now that construction has begun I will be on site at least once a week to take progress pictures. White and Borgognoni are the architects, McCarthy is the construction manager and River City is the general manager on this project. Both are great companies with tons of experience and I'm really privileged to be a part of this project even in a very limited manner.
I've attached a few pictures taken on 4-4-2012 when excavation was just getting underway. The construction will begin with the North wing and move to the West Wing. If you are interested in the project or process you can watch it all live from a video camera posted up on a nearby building (big brother is always watching, lol). Here is the link for it.

http://www.pso.siu.edu/webcams/extension_PG_webcam2.html