Garry Jenkins told a gathering on Sept. 7 that he has noticed a frequent theme in chatting with members of the college community: their warm feelings for 104-year-old Chase Hall. 

“They tell me about special, unforgettable moments that happened here,” Jenkins, president of �ֲ���ý since July, said to a crowd celebrating the building’s re-opening after an in-depth renovation that began last year. 

Former students recall sharing meals in Chase with friends, attending dances and club meetings, and enjoying casual encounters while checking their post-office boxes, Jenkins said. And even as longtime services were relocated from Chase in recent years, leaving students fewer reasons to visit, there was “still something about Chase that made it part of the beating heart of this campus,” he said.

“Now, after 14 months of renovation and rejuvenation, it’s absolutely fantastic [and] ready to bring students and faculty back — throwing open the doors, welcoming people in, ready to be relevant.”

Restoring the relevance of Chase was high on the list as the long-planned renovation tackled a variety of goals: consolidating Student Affairs staff and functions in a handy location, improving physical access to the building, making wayfinding easier, and brightening and opening up spaces once dim and confined.

Moreover, in keeping with other recent building projects at �ֲ���ý, Chase gained not only new spaces for students to study, meet, or zone out, but a wild diversity of configurations and appointments for those spaces. Even the former Dining Services loading dock, now considered part of a plaza that faces Muskie Archives, has been transformed into a place to take one’s ease.

There are ”one million interesting, comfortable nooks and crannies where you can hide out if you need to make a call, review your notes, or have a mindful few minutes,” estimated another speaker at the reopening, Allen Delong, senior associate dean for Purposeful Work and one of the building’s new inhabitants.

“It’s my hope for each of us that we get to know the timeless, beautiful multi-use spaces like Hirasawa and Skelton lounges, and the lovely little quirky ones that you’ll discover on your own,” Delong said to students at the reopening. “Over the years, alumni have made great memories in this building, and starting today you should, too.”

The ceremony took place in the Chase Hall courtyard in a dreamlike haze of angled sun and temps nudging 90. Also speaking was Geoff Swift, �ֲ���ý vice president for finance and administration and treasurer, who joined Jenkins in thanking the parties who helped bring the renovation to a successful conclusion — including Pam Wichroski, retired head of capital planning and construction, who was an early advocate for the project.

Student government Co-President Dhruv Chandra ’25 helped Jenkins and Swift cut the wide garnet ribbon to end the re-opening formalities, whereupon some 250 folks attending the event made for the refreshment tables or entered Chase for a look around. 

Wrapping up: The city of Lewiston issued a certificate of occupancy for Chase on Aug. 25, and staff representing six Student Affairs functions moved in during the last four days of August. (Those functions are Campus Life, Community Standards, Dean of Students, Intercultural Education, Purposeful Work, and Residence Life & Health Education.)

With construction still in progress — because of final repairs from the July rainstorm that drove water into �ֲ���ý buildings including Chase — the move-in was “crazy,” said Paul Farnsworth, senior project manager for �ֲ���ý Facility Services. “But par for the course.” 

“It was challenging, as renovation projects are,” said project manager Kristi Mynhier. “You never know what to expect, and this has been no different. But altogether we had the right team on board” — including the college’s project management staff, construction management firm Consigli Construction, and the architect, Canal Five Studio of Portland, Maine.

“We all worked together as a team and never lost sight of that.”

A few construction chores are still going on, primarily testing new building systems and closing out defects found during the punch-list inspections. 

We took our own look around an hour before the ribbon-cutting. We parked our chassis briefly at the inviting, elevated first-floor scenic viewpoint known as the Overnook, oohed and aahed at lots of colorful furniture, scampered up and down the Central Stair like innocent tots, and admired the expanded, glass-walled reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education.

The carpeting was nice in the Central Stair (and color-coded so you’ll know what level you’re on) and we liked the old-meets-new aesthetic created there by bare brick, glossy wood, and stainless-steel handrails. We also appreciated the bright new finishes applied to portions of Chase otherwise not involved in the renovation, such as the stairway and passage from the lobby to Memorial Commons, and the venerable second-floor Skelton and Hirasawa lounges.

Chase was mostly quiet for our inspection. We encountered only a lost student late for an appointment, a carpenter fitting wooden doors on the second floor, a few alumni happily agog at the building’s look and layout, and Chris Streifel, director of capital projects, at work on his laptop and enjoying the view from the Res Life reception area.

An exception to the tranquillity was in the Center for Purposeful Work, on the first floor, where Delong and other staff were abuzz with the excitement of their attractive new digs. Hoi Ning Ngai, director of employer engagement and business advising, gave us a quick tour. “I love the light,” she said — PW’s corner suite basks in southern sun that pours in through expanses of glass, including the new “lightwell,” a staircase-turned-atrium at the main Campus Avenue entrance. 

Ngai pointed out newly showcased features of the old building’s original architecture, such as prominent wooden trusses that help keep the whole works standing. And she explained that the office culture in Purposeful Work is dynamic. Only Delong and Sheila Anderson, director of operations, marketing and outreach, have permanently assigned offices, while everyone else floats, supported by such apparatus as unobtrusive employee lockers and rewriteable name plaques next to office doors.

Seems like a fitting example for students preparing for post-graduation workplaces much changed from even a few years ago. 

Folks attending the Sept. 7 reopening of Chase Hall look and listen as President Garry Jenkins offers remarks prior to the ribbon-cutting. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

Seen from the Kenison Gate, this image of Chase Hall was taken an hour or so prior to its re-opening ceremony, on Sept. 7. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Looking upward in the lightwell, part of Chase Hall’s reconfigured main entrance onto Campus Avenue. Once this shaft was a stairwell. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A student worker checks in at the Center for Purposeful Work, in newly renovated Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This “bar” in the Purposeful Work suite is equipped with lockers for staff and student workers to stow their stuff. The angled wooden beams are load-bearing trusses that are original to century-old Chase Hall and have been left exposed as a reminder of the building’s long history. (Kristi Mynhier/�ֲ���ý College)

Oak stair treads, blond high-tech floor decking, LED accent lights, and metal handrails all add to the Central Stair’s stylish appeal. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Looking up through the Central Stair. The blond wood is cross-laminated timber, a wood product that’s greener than a traditional concrete and steel structure and much faster to install. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This meeting room in Chase Hall’s new Student Affairs office suite houses a rugged fireplace original to the century-old building. The projecting brick pattern is replicated in decorative brick insets flanking the main Chase entrance. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Comfy seating in the Residence Life offices. Stacked on the windowsill are board games that Res Life staff can borrow for student social events. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

In its latest incarnation, the once-clubby Chase Hall Lounge has a decidely businesslike look. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall Lounge post-renovation. Note the new location of the entrance, and to the right of that, the three indented rectangles — exterior windows that were bricked in when the building was expanded in the late 1940s. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This seating area in the Student Affairs offices is situated about where art and stationery supplies were displayed in the College Store’s Chase Hall days. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A view through glass of the lightwell from Chase Hall’s second-floor lobby. Applying black paint around the windows was among the last chores undertaken in the building’s 14-month makeover. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Daylight in a flex office space in Chase Hall’s Purposeful Work suite. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Cafe-style furniture lends an Old World ambience to this patio created from what was formerly the Dining Services loading dock. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Summery summary: Does a tree falling in the woods make a sound if there’s no one around to hear it (or if someone is there but plugging their ears and singing “La, la, la!” to block it out)?

Does construction take place at �ֲ���ý if Campus Construction Update doesn’t cover it?

We are not credentialed to address the first question. But we can confirm the existence, against all odds, of �ֲ���ý construction that we haven’t covered.

During summer 2023, for instance, Campus Construction Update failed to tell you about new window units being installed at the Residential Village (a project begun in 2022, when we also didn’t mention it). Nor about new finishes beautifying the Plavin Dance Studio locker room, nor modern desks replacing the antediluvian units in two Hathorn Hall classrooms. But those things happened!

Meanwhile, among non–Chase Hall projects that we did bestir ourselves to tell you about, three that �ֲ���ý had planned for the summer are done. (Still outstanding are repairs to Carnegie Science related to water damage from the July 25 cataclysm, but Smith and Hedge halls are fully back to their pre-flood selves.)

The inaugural contest on the brand-new Garcelon Field playing surface took place on Sept. 9, as women’s soccer welcomed Emerson College. The Bobcats didn’t prevail, but Head Coach Joe Vari said that the season opener “was extra-special with the new turf. The surface plays great and makes Garcelon a premier sports complex in Maine.” 

On Sept. 1, improvements to the attic of Hathorn Hall were completed, as builders finished repairing the platform beneath the bell tower, improving the ladder to the hatch leading to the roof, and activating a new HVAC machine. “We were able to wrap up just in the nick of time,” said Project Manager Brian Lanoie.

Also including new walkways, lighting, and retractable stairs for attic access, the project set the stage for replacement of the mechanism for sounding Hathorn’s historic bell. Preparations specific to that job are ongoing.

Finally, at the end of August, representatives from the West Coast firm DBPC finished installing high technology that drives �ֲ���ý’ new Immersive Media Studio. Room 110 in Coram Library is home to the so-called IMStudio, which will enable the elevation of art and performance pieces to new levels of interactivity and sensory stimulation. (Imagine the Star Trek universe “holodecks,” but with less-predictable plot points.)

DBPC also provided training for faculty and staff who will work with students in operating the facility, which comprises four windowless walls coated in “projector screen” paint and an overhead grid that supports the active technology.

During the training “we installed projectors and speakers, and learned how to program the various components of the network system,” said Associate Professor of Theater Tim Dugan. Dugan and Carolina González Valencia, associate professor of art and visual culture, are co–principal investigators of the grant that funded the project. 

“When we tested some video and sound from [music professor] Asha Tamirisa’s and Carolina’s projects for the first time, it was magical. We were elated,” Dugan said.

The IMStudio is an expression of the �ֲ���ý Arts Collaborative program called IMPACT 21st (Innovation, Media, Process, Arts, Collaboration, and Technology for the 21st century), a multifaceted approach to supporting students and faculty engaging in technology-based arts practices and education.

The IMStudio will host “visiting artists to exhibit and/or perform their state-of-the-art works for the community while engaging with students,” Dugan continued. “This will provide faculty, staff, and students with opportunities to integrate technology into the arts curriculum through regular workshops and training, and artist residency programs.”

More broadly, adds González, it’s hoped that the facility will “create the space to collaborate between different disciplines and academic units.”

Needless to say, the studio’s potential for both creativity and education is ripe for exploration. In terms of public exposure, plans for a “soft opening” are afoot, and an arts-faculty collaboration and open house in early December are also in the works. “I couldn’t be more excited about the potential that the IMStudio has to offer the �ֲ���ý community,” Dugan said.

Thanks to Aaron Morse, associate athletic communications director, for additional reporting.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, and reminiscences about construction at �ֲ���ý College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “La, la, la!” in the subject line.

One of the destructive torrential rains that have characterized this summer in New England hit Lewiston and Auburn on July 25.

Across the Twin Cities, the evening storm dumped nearly four inches of rain in less than two hours. It flooded streets, buckled pavements, and briefly shut off electricity to hundreds of residents.

In �ֲ���ý’ neighborhood, the municipal stormwater drainage system was overwhelmed by the runoff. That meant that instead of entering that system as intended, much of the rain falling on �ֲ���ý stayed at �ֲ���ý, backing up into buildings and damaging walls, floors, and some equipment — and sparking an impressive cleanup response by the college’s Facilities Services team.

One of those buildings was Chase Hall — nearly ready to reopen after a 14-month renovation that is making this century-old student center a place that’s more welcoming and easier to navigate.

The storm hit one day after all the new furniture for Chase had arrived, three days before the city of Lewiston was scheduled to conduct its formal occupancy inspection, and less than a week before Student Affairs staff were scheduled to move in.

Most of the damage consisted of wet wallboard and carpeting (some of which was installed just hours before the storm). For the most part, the flood was less than an inch deep, but that was enough to necessitate throwing away new carpet and replacing strips of new wallboard adjoining the floor, along with the attached trim strips called “cove base.”

The stormwater affected portions of the lowest floors of Chase: a Residence Life office suite, the ground floor lobby, the Student Affairs offices in the former College Store site, and the bottom level of the new Central Stair.

That Central Stair location, in fact, was the scene of the most concentrated water damage. The pit at the base of the new elevator shaft filled up with water, which immersed and thereby ruined both the device that controls elevator speed and the cable that raises and lowers the car.

Still, as Senior Project Manager Paul Farnsworth pointed out during our visit on Aug. 1, the pit sequestered a lot of water that could have caused more widespread trouble elsewhere.

So now, more than two weeks after the deluge, where do things stand with Chase?

The city inspection that precedes the building’s certification for occupancy has been rescheduled for Aug. 25. An opening ceremony for the remodeled Chase is planned for Sept. 7.

And sometime in between, on a date or dates still to be determined, staff for Residence Life, the Center for Purposeful Work, and other Student Affairs functions will move into their new offices.

Just to give you some perspective, Student Affairs’ first heavy lift of the new school year — helping the new �ֲ���ýies of the Class of 2027 get settled in — commences on Aug. 31. (For a different kind of perspective, the Bobcat Den reopens Aug. 28 after being closed for much too long.)

If the cloud-and-silver-lining metaphor seems tacky in this instance, it’s still true that the storm’s impact on Chase could have been much worse. Much of the building’s new furniture had been placed in storm-affected areas, but waterproof legs and feet resisted any damage. Replacement of the damaged wallboard is underway, and replacement carpet will be laid after the walls are repainted.

And as Farnsworth pointed out, “If this had happened three weeks later, everyone would have moved in and I would have had to move them all out again.”

The storm’s scrambling of the original Chase timetable has even conferred certain advantages. For example, with the move-in delayed, the project team has been able to tackle so-called day-two items — tasks normally left until after the certificate of occupancy has been issued. “We’re able to get a lot of that work done now, rather than having to come back after the building’s occupied,” said Kristi Mynhier, �ֲ���ý’ project manager for Chase.

In at least one case, in fact, the storm even hastened Chase past a major milestone. As Mynhier explains, it was desirable to get the HVAC system running to help dry out the building. That entailed connecting the system to the campus-wide network of HVAC sensors and controls. So that got done faster than anticipated.

Meanwhile, in areas of Chase that didn’t get wet, the renovation is winding down. With the countertop and other woodwork now in place at the Overnook, the first-floor lobby is about done. The glass walls and doors have been installed around the reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education. And technicians are installing card-access readers in a variety of locations.

As noted, Chase wasn’t the only �ֲ���ý building harmed by the storm: Carnegie Science, Smith, Hedge, and Kalperis halls were the others. “Merrill Gym and Lindholm House had water that was removed, but no real damage to finishes,” notes Jay Phillips, director of Facility Services operations. (There was water erosion and other damage to the campus grounds, too.)

Phillips adds that some 40 �ֲ���ý staffers, including custodians and folks in the building trades, were involved in the clean-up and subsequent repairs. A crew from the cleaning and restoration company ServPro also helped out.

Nearly a week after a storm soaked floors in Chase Hall, getting things dry was still a priority. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

An Aug. 1 image from the Student Affairs office suite shows the aftermath of the July 25 rain: new carpet has been discarded, a 12-inch strip of wallboard removed, and a dehumidifier and fan are drying things out. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Just prior to the July 25 deluge, this Residence Life office had been fully carpeted. Stormwater entering through an HVAC condensate drain soaked, and spoiled, parts of the new carpet that were subsequently stripped out for replacement. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

One outcome of the July 25 stormwater backup into Chase Hall was a profusion of trash cans staged on the loading dock for emptying. But soon the dock, with furniture like something from a Parisian sidewalk cafe, will be a place for repose and for socializing. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A new Purposeful Work interview room on Chase Hall’s second floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Plastic covers still protect much of the new furniture in a second-floor lounge in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

At 89 inches, this television in a second-floor Chase Hall lounge is �ֲ���ý’ largest flatscreen. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Sitting at a new table amidst other furnishings awaiting deployment, a member of the Consigli Construction staff works in Chase Hall Lounge. Note the remodeled ceiling, and the relocated wall in the background. The territory beyond will belong to the Center for Purposeful Work. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

At one time this wall separating the Central Stair and Chase Hall Lounge was the rear outside wall of Chase Hall. During the recent renovation, the old window openings were restored and reglazed to add visual interest to the building’s interior. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Inspired by �ֲ���ý Manufacturing Company bedspreads, woven in Lewiston, decorative metalwork has been applied to the front of the Overnook in Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall’s newly renovated main lobby. The stairway to the left of center leads to Memorial Commons. The corridor at center, adjacent to the new Overnook, leads to the Central Stair. The new staircase behind the column emerges on the second floor at Skelton and Hirasawa lounges. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The stairs and corridor to Memorial Commons have been snazzed up with new paint, floor and step coverings, and handrails. The blue material provides temporary protection to the new flooring. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This seating area in the Center for Purposeful Work backs up to the so-called lightwell, a former stairwell that still encloses one of Chase Hall’s two Campus Avenue entrances. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New paint, carpet, and furniture in a dean’s office in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A view of the Central Stair and its elevator. Note the stylish new handrails. The blue plastic floor protection conceals oak stair treads and flooring (visible overhead) made from cross-laminated timber. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The reconstruction of Chase Hall’s main Campus Avenue entrance was nearly complete on Aug. 1, with just some missing trim and cleaning up to attend to. The doors predate the building’s renovation and were refinished for it. Note the textured brick pattern where the benches meet the building: projecting Flemish bond. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

When a building is flooded, Phillips explains, “It’s critical to get vent holes drilled and walls opened, drying equipment deployed, and lots of air moving within the first 24 hours, or the risk of mold growth increases.

“Our people responded exceptionally well, and their initial response along with continued action the next day prevented further damage and potential mold growth. I’m always impressed by the incredible work our folks perform and their great professionalism under pressure in these difficult situations.”

Projection room: Immersive Media Studio all but done

�ֲ���ý’ new Immersive Media Studio, located in a former classroom and computer lab in Coram Library, is close to completion.

Funded by a $500,000 grant from the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, the facility will support instruction in and production of high-tech performances and installations incorporating sound, live action, and projected imagery.

When we visited on Aug. 1, all but a final coat of wall paint, a white “4K” formula that shows projected images to especially good advantage, had been applied. Black floor tiles were placed this week. The ceiling had been coated in matte black paint. With cables newly strung from the control room next door, the ceiling pipe-grid was ready to support the projectors, theatrical lights, and speakers that will cast the digital spells.

Still in their boxes, those gizmos and others were stockpiled in the control room. Technicians from the West Coast firm DBPC had spent the back half of July in there installing computers and controllers, with plans to return and finish up this month, in time for the start of classes.

Tin-knockers get ducts in a row in Hathorn Hall attic

With installation beginning the last week of July, the new retractable stairs that provide access to Hathorn Hall’s attic are in place. Getting to the attic is still a climb, but now a visitor is spared the claustrophobic aspects of the prior arrangement — a steep ladder, jammed into a closet in a faculty office, that topped out in something like the Munsters’ living room but without the laugh track.

Bright new lighting and solid, easily accessed walkways have put an end to the Munstery aspects.

Also in the attic is a new HVAC machine that replaced an obsolete unit, a substitution that in large part was the impetus for the Hathorn attic project. Cote Corp. of Auburn, known for challenging feats of hoisting and rigging, removed the old machine and brought in the new one, which is roughly the size of a chest freezer. Happily, the elevator was large enough to fit each unit, albeit with tolerances as close as an inch or two, says Brian Lanoie, �ֲ���ý project manager.

The HVAC work also entailed the replacement of a lot of air ducts, work done by the tin-knockers of Nason Mechanical Systems of Auburn. Still to be done on the HVAC front is connecting the new equipment to its power supply and to the campus-wide control network.

More broadly, carpentry contractor M.W. Hoss of Portland needs to restructure the attic floor where a hole was cut for the HVAC equipment (a smaller hole at that location where the new stairs are mounted still remains) and refinish the corresponding third-floor ceiling.

This view was taken from the top of the new retractable ladder serving the Hathorn Hall attic. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New ventilation ducts in the attic of Hathorn Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The installation of this new air handler was a key goal of the summer’s refurbishment of the attic of Hathorn Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Carpenters for M.W. Hoss of Portland, Maine, built this new ladder leading up to the Hathorn Hall belfry. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

And all that work, taking place through August, will complete this phase of the Hathorn attic project. The next phase, the replacement of the ringer for Hathorn’s bell, has yet to be scheduled.

Garcelon Field turf: ‘Bouncy and cushy‘

With athletic practices scheduled to start before the end of August, the overhaul of a landmark sports facility at �ֲ���ý is nearly finished.

Home to Bobcat lacrosse, soccer (occasionally), and — with the deepest historical roots — football, Garcelon Field has received a new playing surface this summer. A product called Legion, made by Shaw Sports Turf, the new artificial turf replaces the surface that was installed in 2010 and had reached the limit of its useful life.

ThenNow

An aerial view of Garcelon Field before and after its turf replacement. Use your mouse to grab the slider (or swipe your finger if on a phone or tablet) to reveal more or less of each image. (Branden Rush/�ֲ���ý College)

Both products comprise a grass-like plastic matrix that’s infilled with a mix of sand and crumb rubber. And both surfaces were installed by R.A.D. Sports of Rockland, Mass.

While the Legion is essentially complete (as is a replacement for the 2010 chain-link fence that had surrounded the field), Garcelon remains closed for another week or two while punch-listing and some tests are being conducted.

The turf came in massive rolls that were spooled out into place across the field by specially equipped tractors. But we were interested to learn from Chris Streifel, �ֲ���ý project manager for the turf replacement, that a significant proportion of the installation was performed by people using hand tools. Their work included finalizing the placement of the rolls, tweaking their seams, and — perhaps most interesting — setting in all but the biggest markings on the turf.

As a multi-sport field, Garcelon uses different colors for markings pertaining to different games. Most of these graphics can’t be fabricated at the factory and have to be created by hand on site. “So a lot of customized stuff would be done right on the field, and they would cut out pieces and sew in new pieces,” explains Streifel, the college’s director of capital planning and construction.

“Then somebody goes through and checks all that. So they actually spent the last week just going over in fine detail all of those seams.” Note that this is all done on hands and knees.

“And now you can’t even tell” that the work was done by hand. “It all blends together like it was always together from day one.” Streifel adds, “It’s a lot of fine detail and a lot of expertise.”

A close-up of the new Legion playing surface on Garcelon Field shows the artificial grass and the sand-and-crumb-rubber infill. (Jay Burns/�ֲ���ý College)

The north end of the newly resurfaced Garcelon Field. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

As Garcelon Field is a multi-sport facility, different colors indicate markings on the turf for different games. Most of these field graphics were sewn in by hand. (Jay Burns/�ֲ���ý College)

The colors pop on Garcelon Field’s new Legion playing surface. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A view of the new Legion playing surface, made by Shaw Sports Turf, on Garcelon Field. Many of the markings shown were cut and stitched in by hand. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

“It was a very smooth project,” he notes. Because �ֲ���ý issued its request for bids on the project early, the college was able to get a high slot on R.A.D.’s calendar and avoid the cumulative delays that are almost inevitable over the course of a busy contractor’s summer. “I have nothing but good things to say about the R.A.D. Sports team and Gale Associates, our designer.” Gale is based in Portland.

“The field’s awesome,” Streifel continues. “It’s so fun to step on. It’s so bouncy and cushy, and if I was going to get tackled hard by somebody at this point, that’s where I’d want to have it happen.”

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions and comments about past, present, future, and past-perfect construction at �ֲ���ý to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “Does this work make you tense?” in the subject line.

Still a constellation of construction hotspots, but with �ֲ���ý folks scheduled to move back in by the second week of August, newly refurbished Chase Hall had a certain air of anticipation when we visited last week — something along the lines of, “Is it Christmas yet?”

Well, Ralphie, we’re getting there. Parts of the building are all but finished, sitting empty and quiet, such as the first-floor Purposeful Work suite and the second-floor corridor that parallels Campus Avenue. On the second floor, in fact, the conclusive inspection protocol known as punch-listing began last Friday.

In other Chase spaces, though, the 15-month renovation continues full tilt, with tools and supplies fully deployed, various plastics protecting new finishes, extension cords feeding power from temporary electrical boxes, and sprinkler hoses and data cables dangling from open ceiling grids.

In the big picture, as we’ve reported previously, project management firm Consigli Construction expects to hand control of the building back to �ֲ���ý by the end of July. An interesting focus of attention at the moment is the fire protection system, which includes — in addition to alarms, sprinklers, and illuminated exit signs — controls that, in the event of a fire, switch off the electromagnets that hold certain doors open. The resulting automatic closures of those strategically placed doors can help contain a blaze.

Another system that’s desirable to have in place by the time people move back in, though not directly related to life-safety, comprises local controls for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, says �ֲ���ý Project Manager Kristi Mynhier.

Specifically, there are gizmos that tell the system when humans enter a room so that local air flow and temperature will adjust to accommodate their comfort — an amenity that, in the interest of energy conservation, is otherwise quiescent. Those devices are known as occupancy sensors. Professionals call them as “occ sensors,” but that strikes us as occward jargon.

Bond — projecting Flemish bond: When we visited on June 27, bricklayers were piecing in a bold decorative pattern known as projecting Flemish bond on either side of the main Campus Avenue entrance. Over the entrance, the wooden form for a stainless steel awning was in place. Stainless panels on either side lent a sense of how all the steel trim might look when it’s complete.

Around the corner near the Muskie Archives, new facing had been applied to the sides of the former Chase loading dock, which is becoming a sort of patio. A new floor surface, railings, and outdoor furniture are coming soon. Together with gray asphalt pavers that were recently laid at either side, the area will be known as a plaza.

Inside, specifically in Chase Hall Lounge, new “faux beams” have joined the originals. None of these non-load-bearing features hold up the ceiling, but they do prettify it, and the new faux beams will contain light fixtures, so they can lord that sense of practical purpose over the old beams. New hardwood floorboards for the lounge were stacked in the first-floor lobby to acclimate and will be laid near the end of the renovation.

But new oak stair steps are already being installed on the central stair, a sort of three-dimensional crossroads that connects four levels of the building. The job involves two trades, as carpenters fasten the wood in place and rout out a rectangular depression to fit rubber treads, which will then be glued in by flooring installers. Easier to replace than the wooden steps, the inserts will take the wear from all the feet that use the stair (a song lyric in the making!).

Painters are coating the walls throughout the central stair. (And they’ve finished that eye-catching saturated red on the elevator’s wallboard enclosure.)

Painting is in progress in the first-floor lobby, too, including the new Overnook, that slightly elevated seating area along one wall. Before too long, it will sport new steel railings, which are being fabricated in a pattern resembling the famed �ֲ���ý Manufacturing bedspreads once woven in Lewiston. And that lobby is being cleared of building supplies, aside from the lounge floorboards.

On the upper level of the ground floor — let’s try that again. On what has been called the loading dock level and is now the plaza level — see above — the Residence Life office suite has made big strides since our last visit. Glass doors have been hung at the entrance, most utility terminal fixtures are in place, shiny fan-coil heater-coolers cling to the walls, and fresh paint abounds.

Temporarily a place to store paint, this is the future home of the �ֲ���ý Musicians Union. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Here’s a view of the central stair approached from Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby. The red walls enclose the elevator shaft. The two ladders stand at the entrance to the Office of Intercultural Education. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall’s new air handling machine. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The “Overnook,” a distinctive seating area in Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby, looks spiffy with new wallboard and paint on June 27. Sections of air duct are currently stashed there. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This hardwood flooring will be installed in Chase Hall Lounge toward the end of the Chase renovation. Shown on June 27, it was stored in the Chase Hall lobby to acclimate. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New landscaping in front of Chase Hall on a gray day in June. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A handrail awaits its installation in a new stairwell in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Floor-to-ceiling glass admits a lot of light into this new “huddle” meeting room in the Residence Life offices. A former Dining Services loading dock, just outside the glass, will be transformed into a patio. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Once the Chase Hall loading dock, this concrete platform is being transformed into a patio. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Good griddance

Since our last visit to Coram 110, the future site of �ֲ���ý’ Immersive Media Studio, its walls have been stripped of features. With the goal of rendering the walls into a smooth white surface suitable for image projection, the space has lost, among other things, interior window frames, chalkboards and projection screens, ventilation grilles, outlets for electricity and data, and a species of wood trim called a chair rail that kept belligerent furniture from roughing up the walls.

While daylight was abundant in the room during our visit, the outdoors won’t be viewable from the former classroom for long: Plywood panels that we saw stacked against the walls will soon block the window openings on the inside, although the exterior frames will remain.

But you know the old saying: When a window closes, a ceiling grid appears, and that’s what has happened in Coram 110. Specifically, it’s a theatrical-grade pipe grid. Composed of black 1.5-inch steel pipe, this sturdy frame will enable studio users “to hang anything anywhere,” said Senior Project Manager Paul Farnsworth, referring to the lights, projectors, speakers, and other gear (disco balls?) that will provide images and sounds for productions in the studio.

The ceiling will be painted black so as not to draw attention away from the immersive art and performance action taking place below. The floor, too, will be black, in the form of quartz tiles.

An adjacent room will be equipped as the studio’s control center, home to the high-powered technology that will drive productions in the studio. In the early project planning, that function was located right in 110 itself. But the erstwhile occupant of the room next door, Michael Hanrahan, �ֲ���ý’ director for curricular and research computing, volunteered to move his office to Hedge Hall, thereby freeing more space for productions in the studio itself.

The control room, Farnsworth pointed out, houses one of the two massive fireplaces that originally helped to heat Coram, built in 1902. That fireplace has long been hidden behind wall board — but workers drilled through an upper corner of its 120-year-old brick facade to make way for cables that will connect the 21st-century control center to the immersive-studio gizmos on the ceiling grid.

Talk about worlds colliding.

Pad notes

At Garcelon Field, the 13-year-old FieldTurf was removed during the third week of June in preparation for a new playing surface, which is being laid now. When we visited on June 27, the dirt substrate had been graded and a small crew from the project contractor, R.A.D. Sports of Rockland, Mass., was placing a layer of shock-absorbent turf pads that would buffer between the ground and the playing surface itself.

Weighing just a few pounds apiece, the pads are composed of an aggregate of recycled chunks of soft rubber or plastic. It took 4,275 of them to blanket the field, which measures about 100,000 square feet.

They are laid held together by tabs and indents superficially resembling jigsaw puzzle pieces, but in regular shapes and intervals, making the pad layer easy to assemble but not much fun on a rainy day up to camp.

Meanwhile, 40 or so plastic-wrapped rolls of the new playing surface itself, a Shaw Sports Turf product called Legion, were stockpiled around Garcelon along with giant sacks of the sand-and-rubber-crumb infill that will finish the installation. Placement of the Legion started this week, with infill to follow by mid-July.

In this June 21 image, the Garcelon Field crew from R.A.D. Sports has finished removing the 2010 FieldTurf surface. (Aaron Morse/�ֲ���ý College)

In this June 27 image, Garcelon Field has been stripped of its old playing surface and the placement of shock-absorbing panels on the bare ground is about to begin. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Stockpiled near the Garcelon Field scoreboard on June 27 are shock pads that will underlay the field’s new playing surface. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Placing shock-absorbing turf pads on Garcelon Field as an underlayment for the forthcoming Legion playing surface. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The turf pads that form a shock-absorbing layer underneath the Garcelon playing surface are made from recycled materials. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Shown near Central Avenue on June 27 are some of the 40 rolls of Shaw Sports Turf that will soon be placed on Garcelon Field. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Ring, but no swing

Over at Hathorn Hall, someone cut a big hole in the third-floor ceiling. All part of the plan, of course, as retractable stairs will eventually be installed in the hole to improve access to the building’s attic and its historic bell.

In addition to the hole in the ceiling (something that some of us get to enjoy with no effort whatsoever!), the project team addressed two other objectives that will make the completion of the overall project easier and safer. One was the installation of several long LED light fixtures, replacing a few dim, widely dispersed lamps. The other was the creation of new walkways.

The hole, by the way, will come in handy during next week when old HVAC machines and ductwork are removed from the attic and a new machine is winched up there for installation. Cote Corp. of Auburn will handle that rigging job. Sometime later, the hole will be smallified to fit the new stairs.

The HVAC upgrade is a major goal of the Hathorn project. A second is to improve access to the bell, whose ringing mechanism will be replaced in hopes of returning the bell to its former prominence. In response to a question from Bruce Lyman ’67, we learned that an electromagnetic striker will supplant the current winch and cable that currently swing the bell. (It hasn’t been determined whether the striker will contact the inside of the bell or the outside.)

A necessary concession to cost and practicality, the proposed striker will mean the bell no longer swings to ring. But a representative of the ringing mechanism provider, Elderhorst Bells Inc. of Palm, Pa., assures us that the striker can be made to emulate the characteristic, romantic “double ring” of a swinging bell before it comes to rest.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions and comments about past, present, future, and past-perfect construction at �ֲ���ý to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “You used that Flemish bond joke already before!” in the subject line.

To one extent or another, renovations are always about history — finding a happy middle ground between what has been and what could be.

But sometimes, the historical aspect looms disproportionately large. That’s the case at �ֲ���ý this summer. In the context of Garry Jenkins’ arrival in a few weeks as the college’s new president, as well as Reunion this weekend, facility makeovers that might otherwise seem ho-hum (except, of course, to Campus Construction Update) suddenly seem to have new meaning and importance.

Updates to �ֲ���ý’ oldest building are focused on its bell, known since 1857 as a unifying voice on campus. A classroom in Coram Library, built in 1902 and also a campus landmark, is becoming a state-of-the-art venue for tech-driven immersive performance. Garcelon Field, named for a key supporter of the college at its founding and considered to be among the 10 oldest college football fields in the U.S., is getting a new playing surface.

And, of course, the latest reinvention of Chase Hall, for more than a century the orbital center of student life at �ֲ���ý, is nearly complete.

In a pair of Campus Construction Updates, we’ll look at the Chase renovation and �ֲ���ý’ forthcoming Immersive Media Studio this week — followed next week by the Garcelon turf replacement and the refurbishing of Hathorn Hall’s attic and belfry.

And here’s Chase Hall Lounge in May 2023. Near the end of the current renovation, additional “faux” beams, as well as paint, will be applied to the ceiling and a hardwood floor will be placed. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall seen from the Kenison Gate on May 31, 2023. Twin ramps converge from the sidewalk toward the Chase entrance. Note the new loam and trees, and the darker-gray bench seating. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

All the glass in this former stairwell will flood Chase Hall’s reconfigured entrance near the Kenison Gate with natural light, transforming it to a “lightwell.” (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This May 23 photo shows steps under construction near a Campus Avenue entrance to Chase Hall. The pink stuff is insulation and the wire mesh will insulate the concrete that’s about to be placed here. Flexible pipes, like the ones at right, will soon be embedded in the concrete to carry antifreeze as part of a snowmelt system. (Paul Farnsworth/�ֲ���ý College)

A worker fetches a ladder from a staging point on Chase Hall’s new Central Stair. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A corridor through Chase Hall’s second floor. The wooden trusses are original to this century-old section of Chase. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A student lounge on Chase Hall’s second floor, where a yearlong Chase renovation is furthest advanced. The blue material on the floor protects brand-new carpeting from incidental damage. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A view of the lightwell and Chu Hall from a second-floor lounge in Chase Hall. It’s bound to be a popular spot. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

But no pressure: Given Chase Hall’s long history as a center for student life at �ֲ���ý, hard-hat tours of Chase offered this weekend as part of Reunion activities may be a popular draw.

Which has upped the pressure on the Chase renovation team. The second floor is all but finished, says project manager Kristi Mynhier, and the first floor is “well on its way,” notably a striking corner suite of Purposeful Work offices and the nearby Chase lobby.

On the ground floor, Student Life offices sited in the former College Store location (and a bowling alley prior to that) are nearing completion, while the Residential Life suite, at the other end of the building, hasn’t progressed quite so far. But all the “ground-floor storefront” — aka glass walls — “is going to be 100 percent complete” by June 9.

Altogether, says Mynhier, “that’ll be a good setup for the building tours inside.”

Among specific treats for Reunion visitors is the Overnook, that new, slightly elevated study area in the lobby. By June 9 it should be showing some paint and, more exciting, new metal railings that will heighten the site’s aesthetic and social appeal.

Down the hall from the Overnook, toward the Office of Intercultural Education, the so-called Central Stair will sport new paint on walls and trim — notably a rich crimson on the elevator shaft. But because heavy work is still ongoing, the snazzy laminated floor decking will remain under protective cover, and the oak stair treads won’t be installed till late in the project.

Nearby, the OIE has gained one new office, while a row of adjoining offices originally walled with translucent plastic, thereby resembling a greenhouse, have been rebuilt with wallboard and acoustic insulation.

Chase Hall’s primary Campus Avenue entrance, now situated slightly below street level, has bench seating on the outside and will be brilliant with natural light on the inside. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New asphalt pavers have been laid on both sides of the former Chase Hall loading dock, which will be spruced up for use as a patio. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New loam and trees have been placed on the Campus Avenue side of Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Landscaping in progress at Chase Hall on May 31. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Sinks, mirrors, and soap dispensers have been installed in a new first-floor rest room in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Meanwhile, the former Dining Services loading dock facing Muskie Archives is transitioning to patio space, with new surface treatments and railings and surrounded by new pavement. Ultimately there will be cafe-style tables and chairs like the ones on the Bobcat Den patio.

And around the corner on Campus Avenue, grass seed has been strewn over fresh loam, new trees have been planted, and pavements for sidewalk and the entryway near the Kenison Gate have been laid. Better yet, now passers-by can even see all this progress, as most of the construction-site fencing has been removed. Only a few chain-link gates remain to block access to certain areas.

Speaking of that Campus Avenue entry near Kenison, we were pleased to pass through it for the first time since it was rebuilt. (The pleasures of campus construction reporting are weird but sweet.)

Where it once opened onto the first floor, new steps and ramps now lead into the ground level via a former stairwell that’s now a “lightwell,” thanks to bright new paint and ample glass facing inward and out. Senior Project Manager Paul Farnsworth, our guide for a Chase tour last week, pointed out that thanks to a southern exposure, the new precast benches outside the entrance were “toasty” even back in March.

“You’re going to see people hanging out here.”

Meet our panel: An acute source of ��������à vanished in late May when the building’s new electrical panel emerged from the fog of supply-chain issues and arrived at �ֲ���ý. The 800-pound panel has been assembled in a mechanical space off the ground floor and is being connected currently. (See what we did there?)

A functioning panel will make it possible to test both the building’s new elevator, located in the Central Stair, and the HVAC machinery that had showed up at mid-month. That’s important because a deadline is looming that’s even heavier than Reunion.

“By the end of June, we’ll really need to have the electrical install complete,” says Mynhier, “so we can arrange the elevator inspection.” That will allow four weeks to get the inspection done in time for �ֲ���ý and project management firm Consigli Construction to declare that the project has attained substantial completion, thereby returning control of the building to �ֲ���ý.

Riggers and engineers attend to components of Chase Hall’s new energy recovery ventilator, newly loaded into the building on May 17, 2023. (Jay Burns/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall’s new air handling machine. It shares a new mechanical room on the first floor with an energy recovery ventilator. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Mechanical engineers connect the new energy recovery ventilation unit in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Located in the Office of Intercultural Education reception area, this energy recovery ventilator will move air down to the Residence Life office suite. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The project team also needs to bring all aspects of the renovation to a point where punch-listing — the protocol of detailed inspections that typically ends building projects — can be done. By July 17, when furniture will be delivered, “the goal is to have all of the spaces finished enough that we can create a list of work that needs to either be repaired or finished.”

That’s because the furniture delivery itself, large heavy objects being what they are, could inflict minor damage. So the project team needs an inventory of fixes that were outstanding prior to that delivery.

The order of punch-list inspections, by the way, has changed somewhat since we last described it. As noted above, that process will begin on the second-floor, which at this point needs only sensor installations and a thorough cleaning. The punch-listing will conclude in Chase Hall Lounge, because one of the final steps in the entire renovation will be the placement of a new hardwood floor there. That comes late in the game to minimize the likelihood of collateral damage from work elsewhere in the building.

In an undated photo, students shoot pool in the basement of Chase Hall. (Edmund S. Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)

Formerly part of the College Store, this space on Chase Hall’s ground floor will soon be the office of Joshua McIntosh, �ֲ���ý’ vice president for campus life. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A view through the new Student Life office suite, located in the former site of the College Store. Note the new wood trim framing the meeting room at center — a space that houses a fireplace original to century-old Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Painting and utilities work are still in progress in the Residence Life reception area on Chase Hall’s ground floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Speaking of large heavy objects, the May 17 load-in of the new air handler and energy recovery ventilator happened without trouble. Riggers from Auburn’s Cote Corporation started around 6:30 a.m. and were done by 8, wrangling the units through the Chase lobby, up a ramp, and into a newly configured mechanical room.

We were interested to learn that the design of the ERV, which extracts warmth and moisture from flowing air and directs those humors where they’ll do the most good, was influenced by the pandemic. The machine uses a series of increasingly fine filters, as characterized by so-called MERV ratings, to clean the airflow of particles— the larger the MERV, the smaller the particles a filter can trap.

Pre-pandemic, MERV 8 was considered the standard for cleaning recirculated air. Now it’s MERV 13 — which can intercept the COVID-19 virus. The six filters in �ֲ���ý’ new ERV range from 8 to 13. (MERV stands for Minimum Efficiency Reporting Values, so it shouldn’t be confused with the late talk-show host, whose efficiency was never in doubt.)

In the White Room: If other summer 2023 projects at �ֲ���ý seek to update what you might call heirloom technology, there’s one underway in Coram Library — built in 1902 as the college’s primary library — that’s purely about the here and now.

A longtime computer lab and classroom, Coram 110 is being converted into an immersive media studio: a space enabling the creation of “immersive sound composition performances and installations, as well as multimedia installations that weave together animation, sound, video projection, devised performance, drawing and visual media, and complex lighting, sound, and projection design,” as our colleague Mary Pols reported in October. (So much for putting on a show in Grandpa’s barn.)

For all that, the construction aspect of the project is easy to summarize: “I’m just making a box with clean walls,” says Paul Farnsworth, who’s managing the project. “The idea is to make a nice surface everywhere” to project images onto.

So the walls of this large room will be rendered perfectly smooth and featureless: windows boarded up, and projections like picture moldings, light switches, ventilation grills, etc., removed. The resulting surface will be given a Level Five drywall finish — the top grade — and then a coating of so-called 4K paint, aka theater-screen paint.

In addition, a pipe grid upon which to hang projectors, lights, and speakers will be mounted on the ceiling, and grid and ceiling will be painted black for relative invisibility.

Supporting the project is a $500,000 grant from The Sherman Fairchild Foundation. The grant is also supporting four years of programming for the studio, as well as the purchase and installation of two ceramic kilns for the Olin Arts Center.

Handling the electronics for the project is DBPC, a West Coast purveyor of high-tech production and installation services whose clients have included Harvard University and Netflix.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you — especially if you tour Chase Hall during Reunion and have an impression you’d like to share. If not, we still like hearing from you: Please send questions, comments, and thoughts having no bearing on construction at �ֲ���ý College whatsoever to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “Wire you always making such bad puns about electricity?” in the subject line.

That was then: On Oct. 25, a week before the deadline for their completion, the hardscaping projects at Coram and Ladd libraries were the focus of intense activity.

“This is crunch time,” said Paul Farnsworth, Facility Services project manager for the projects in front and in back of Coram Library: the expansion of Coram Terrace and the revamping of Ladd Plaza. “We have all the materials, finally, and we have all the people. Now the weather is the challenge.” Nearly three inches of rain fell on Lewiston in October.

Among those feeling the crunch were workers for project contractor Contracting Specialists Inc. They’d been putting in 10-hour days, and floodlights by the terrace enabled them to see their work when they got there each day at 6, an hour before sunrise.

Spreading topsoil over the location of the recently installed steam lines feeding the Olin Arts Center. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A scooter commuter enjoys the fresh asphalt on the two-lane connector between Ladd Plaza and the Historic Quad. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Ipe, okay? An early adopter of the new Ladd Plaza seating technology takes a call on Oct. 31. The wood covering the bench is called ipe. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Landscapers fill the planters in a cluster of concrete furniture on Ladd Plaza. The plantings include a decorative onion that was a 2018 Perennial of the Year. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

So-called barren strawberries, which resemble but aren't the tasty fruit, are ready to be planted on Ladd Plaza. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Some of the masons were placing the big granite pavers, 18 by 36 inches each, on the Coram Terrace floor. Curing blankets were heaped around, ready to spread over fresh-laid granite to keep the mortar from freezing. Other workers nearby fitted precast stone facing onto walls adjacent to the new stairs that connect Ladd Terrace to the Historic Quad.

A Lull forklift brought materials to that team from a stockpile near the Gray Athletic Building. Meanwhile, little front-end loaders — yep, Bobcats — scooted around and a junior excavator stood by to lift granite and move soil. Electricians ran cables from Coram out to in-ground receptacles for video and sound equipment.

Farnsworth himself was a bit crunched. Originally scheduled for substantial completion by the start of school, the library projects were slowed by supply delays.

In particular, the granite for Coram Terrace came late. “The marketplace for granite is really busy,” said Farnsworth.

Drilling granite for a fastener at Coram Terrace on Oct. 10, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

He also explained that the process for precision-cutting stone can slow things down a bit. The contractor, who is on the work site and can assess how things actually need to fit together, submits so-called shop drawings with measurements to the architect for approval. And it’s those approved drawings that the stonecutters work from.

You’ll recall that the terrace, which faces the Historic Quad, has been expanded to make it a better stage for academic ceremonies like Convocation. In the absence of the granite, Convocation this year took place on the terrace’s new concrete slab, bare but dressed up with flowers.

The granite showed up around the beginning of October. The CSI crew began by placing blocks around the slab perimeter to form a low parapet. Next came the steps, a particularly fussy fitting job, and then applying fascia blocks around the vertical face of the slab, which required excavating around it.

Finally, onto a bed of mortar, the team laid and grouted the pavers over which the graduates of 2019 and beyond will stride to receive their diplomas, and across which we’ll all walk on the unceremonial days of the year, not giving CSI and their hard work a thought.

With the Ladd Plaza renovation done enough to accommodate traffic, the library’s main entrance reopened on Oct. 1, 2018. Here’s the plaza two days later. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Up on Ladd Plaza, the pace was more relaxed. This was a sharp contrast to the summer and early fall, when the plaza was off-limits as it was torn up, a leaky subterranean water barrier replaced, and the whole works rebuilt to a higher technical and aesthetic standard.

With temporary signs pointing the way during the construction, visitors could access the library only through a ground-level service door facing Hedge Hall.

But the plaza and the library’s main entrance were reopened on Oct. 1, and by the 25th workers were concentrating on just a few tasks, mostly related to the aesthetics of this site intended to be an al fresco living room.

And this is now: On Oct. 31, hours before deadline, the Ladd Plaza renovation and the Coram Terrace expansion were more or less complete.

A scooter commuter enjoys the fresh asphalt on the two-lane connector between Ladd Plaza and the Historic Quad. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Along with punch lists, some strewing of soil and grass seed, and other chores of the tidying-up variety, the work yet unfinished involves the pedestrian connections between the plaza and the Historic Quad.

The northern route, at the Hedge end of Coram, is in service but awaits metal railings on its ADA-accessible ramp. Those will show up just before Thanksgiving.

Parallel to that concrete ramp, a second walkway was paved on Tuesday as part of a wide-ranging asphalt-a-thon by local firm Cooper Paving, and was opened soon thereafter.

Still closed is the southern access to Ladd, near Carnegie Science, while the placement of precast stone facing continues. That job will be done by the end of next week.

Landscapers fill the planters in a cluster of concrete furniture on Ladd Plaza. The plantings include a decorative onion that was a 2018 Perennial Plant of the Year. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Up on the plaza on Halloween afternoon, workers for Davis Landscape Co. of Lisbon, Maine, were planting plants in planters. These fixtures are combined with seating to form a cluster of concrete “furniture” that cleverly conceals the top of a Ladd Library elevator shaft.

It’s a good time of year to set out perennials, and the Davis landscapers were all green thumbs as they went to town with sumac, blueberries, barren strawberries (not actually a strawberry), sedum, and grasses. And don’t forget the decorative onions — never forget the decorative onions!

In this case, it’s a butterfly-friendly variety called Allium Millenium (yep, one “n”), named the 2018 Perennial of the Year by the Perennial Plant Association, which prioritizes other horticultural virtues over correct spelling, and rightly so.

The other major outstanding task was also at the cluster. Carpenters were nearly done covering the square concrete benches with wood that makes them more inviting visually and, er, posteriorly. The other benches scattered around the plaza, seven of them, had been ready for a couple of days.

Eeep, it’s ipe: two benches on Ladd Plaza newly topped with the hardwood called ipe. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The wood on the benches is a new one to us: ipe. Rhyming with “eBay,” this chocolate-brown, too-heavy-to-float Brazilian hardwood is something of a double-edged sword as a building material.

Not only is it good-looking, but it’s extremely durable and will survive years of Maine weather. But that durability also makes it tough and difficult to work, to the extent that it tends to quickly dull cutting tools used on it.

(Moreover, the Google says that ipe smells like vanilla or cinnamon when it’s cut. This was not our experience. It’s true that we could have devoted more time to the effort, but persons smelling sawdust at a work site tend to attract unwelcome attention.)

A look around the plaza revealed not just ipe-covered benches but the handsome barriers that, completed just within the last few days, fill selected gaps in the brick parapet wall. The barriers consist of black metal uprights with stainless steel cables strung through them, and ipe handrails on top.

Welding a joint on steam pipes in front of Wentworth Adams Hall in the rain on Oct. 11, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Sightlines helped determine where those fencelike intervals would go. In keeping with a larger trend in �ֲ���ý architecture, dating back at least to the building of Pettengill Hall, the plaza renovation has been designed to maximize views into and out of the site.

Aside from the bustle around the cluster, though, there was nothing much to see besides the students using the library. We went into Coram and exited onto the terrace, trying out the new granite. A couple of masons had just grouted the last three pavers and were packing up.

Cooper Paving, too, had knocked off for the day, leaving a power roller and an asphalt spreader parked by the Class of 1906 Gate. The yellow tape marking the construction zone around Coram was gone. We headed back to the office.

It’s all over but the paving: The steam-line replacement at North Bardwell Street was functionally completed, as predicted, in mid-October.

You’ll recall that the project was stalled for a while by a change in the pipeline routing and the consequent need to fabricate new pipes. Those arrived during the first week of October, were connected and tested the following week by ATA Piping, and were buried the week after that, said Alan Kelley, project manager.

All that’s left to do is to put a top coat of asphalt on the roadway (don’t get us started again on ) and stripe it. All that should happen next week.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update welcomes your questions and comments about campus improvements. Please e-mail news writer Doug Hubley, stating “Construction Update” or “Is that a trick question?” in the subject line.

Spreading topsoil over the location of the recently installed steam lines feeding the Olin Arts Center. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

If you have worked with them, you know that sand and paving blocks complement each other in deeply gratifying ways.

Loose sand is easy to work with as you grade a bedding layer for your new patio or walk. Yet when you compact sand, it firms up to hold pavers in place while you fine-tune their positioning.

Some layers of the Ladd Plaza reconstruction: from left, sand, snowmelt tubing, protective fabric, blue root-proof fabric that will underlie a planter, more sand, stockpiled pavers. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Sand is important for drainage, too: If you want your pavers to slope such that water will run off them, you create that slope, or pitch, by contouring the sand bed. And the sand itself, of course, lets moisture seep into the ground and replenish the water table.

Such were our thoughts on Aug. 28 as we watched a Contracting Specialists Inc. crew spread sand and lay pavers on Ladd Plaza — a key phase in the summer-long reconstruction of the plaza.

It was early afternoon, and we’d gotten there in time to see the crew rolling wheelbarrows over plywood runners laid atop the dunes to distribute the very last load of bedding sand for the project.

Paving progress on Ladd Plaza on Aug. 28, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

There was a lot of sand around. The plaza was baking in bright sun and a temperature of 92. We couldn’t help but think of deserts and beaches (and the to “Under the Boardwalk”). Only a few patches on the plaza still lacked their two-inch sandy layer.

A foreman used electronic surveying gear, which signaled its progress with penetrating beeps, to check the elevation of the sand. Lengths of shiny metal conduit marked off zones that needed grading, which the crew performed with screeds and boards.

To direct precipitation to the drains, the pitch of the sand had to parallel the pitch of the plaza’s concrete deck, several inches and several layers of material below. (Replacement of a no-longer-waterproof membrane atop the concrete necessitated the Ladd Plaza project.)

Workers use a paver placer to set a tile on Ladd Plaza. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Meanwhile, along the edges of the plaza closest to Dana Chemistry, masons were placing pavers. Nearly two feet square, exactly two inches thick, and ordered in two colors for the Ladd project — limestone gray and charcoal — the concrete pavers were manufactured by Hanover Architectural Products of Hanover, Pa.

Project Manager Paul Farnsworth explained that project architect Gale Associates had designated one corner of Ladd Library as a starting point for paver-laying that would make it easiest to align the squares correctly as the pavement is spread across the site.

“The concern we have about laying pavers, or tiles in general, is that by the time you’ve worked your way to the far wall you find out that wall isn’t perfectly square with the one you started from. So you end up with a bunch of odd-cut pavers,” Farnsworth said.

“I had the plaza surveyed and the architect also did measurements. Both were in agreement. So when we designed the pavers on paper, we were confident that in the field we won’t have a bunch of awkward-size pavers.” (We just tell visitors that we designed the Campus Construction Update patio that way.)

This is one of the sensors that will activate the Ladd Plaza snowmelt system. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Working in pairs, a half-dozen or so masons used a paver placer to set the squares. Very cool: Connected by hose to a vacuum pump, a suction pad at the base of this device muckled onto each paver. Two sets of handles enabled easy lifting and precise placement (and intact fingers, as the masons’ hands stay clear of the heavy pavers themselves.)

Plastic spacers maintained the requisite gap between squares. A different variety of sand was used to fill the gaps: Alliance-brand Supersand Bond in slate gray, precisely calibrated and treated with polymers to create a durable joint.

The 17,000 square feet of the plaza will be paved in a pattern called running bond, which comprises straight courses that are staggered relative to their mates on either side. The charcoal squares will form “carpets” where planters and seating will be grouped. “It’s to break the scale so [the expanse] is not so monolithic,” Farnsworth explained.

Contracting Specialists Inc. staff cross an array of tubing for the Ladd Plaza snowmelt system on Aug. 20, the day installation began. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The masons were advancing across a wide front. One benefit (and one of the many obvious facts that become obvious only after they are pointed out to Campus Construction Update) is that the broader the front, the more masons you can fit in and the faster the work will go. Even at that, it will take a few weeks to lay all the pavers.

The few remaining unsandy patches displayed something interesting: 3/4-inch orange plastic tubing densely arrayed in graceful curves.

The tubing is part of a radiant snowmelting system that keep plaza walkways clear and reduce the workload for Facility Services crews after a storm. A heated antifreeze made of water and propylene glycol will circulate through the 9,200 feet of tubing to warm the plaza pavement, or least important walkways across it.

A maze of tubing that belongs to the radiant snowmelt system was completed Aug. 23. In the background is Coram Library, along with stockpiles of sand and pavers that will cover the tubing. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A new heat exchanger in Ladd’s mechanical room will tap the campus steam supply to warm up the antifreeze. Two benches near the library entrance will conceal the connections between the exchanger and the tubing. And temperature-precipitation sensors embedded in the pavement will tell the system when to get busy.

Two days after tubing installation began, a successful pressure test on Aug. 22 marked the completion of the system.

Pavers destined for the Ladd Library Plaza are stockpiled on the service road near Chase Hall on Aug. 2, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

After learning from Farnsworth that, in addition to its usefulness as a heat-transfer medium, propylene glycol is also a food additive — anyone for ice cream? — we turned to the Google for a quick briefing on the compound.

It’s a source chemical, or feedstock, for the production of space-age polymers. It’s in the vapor that gives vaping its name. It’s a solvent. It’s a component in paint, eye drops, hand sanitizer and coffee-based drinks. It’s even the stuff that looks like smoke coming from the stack of your Consolidation-type Lionel toy steam locomotive.

Propylene glycol: Is there anything it can’t do? (Apologies to Homer Simpson.)

Steps that replaced an asphalt walkway up to Ladd Plaza were poured in late July. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Steps action: Transfixed by concrete artistry at Coram Terrace and paver-sand interaction on Ladd Plaza, we’ve neglected to keep you abreast of developments around and between those �ֲ���ý landmarks.

At the end of July, Sundown Construction of Auburn poured a set of concrete steps to replace one of the two asphalt ramps that flank Coram Library and connect the Historic Quad to Ladd Plaza. The still-unfinished steps, situated at the Carnegie Science end of Coram, are part of a new plan for plaza access.

Where the ramp, a banking, and a rambunctious forsythia bush once dominated the junction of quad and plaza, there is now a sunny cleared space. Up the new steps and on the plaza at right, an alcove that was once blocked (or menaced), by the forsythia now affords a fine view west across the quad. A bench is bound for that spot.

With a bench in place and the old rampaging forsythia gone, visitors to the Ladd Plaza will be able to savor a long view across the Historic Quad. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The matching ramp at the other end of Coram is currently a staging area and the main access for contractors renovating the plaza. But once that work is complete, the old walkway will give way to both a redesigned ramp for handicapped access and a stairway.

Earlier in August, excavation for a new foundation at the site turned into something like archaeology. The dig revealed a mysterious old duct that, it was revealed, ran from a restroom ventilator in Coram’s basement into an exhaust vent embedded in the plaza’s parapet wall.

Shown on Aug. 7, copper-coated flashing will direct moisture that’s seeping through Coram Library’s walls down onto the plaza pavement where it can drain. The outer layer of bricks is secure despite the missing bricks: The chunks of 4-by-4 just provide an extra measure of support. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Kind of a roundabout job, as Farnsworth noted. The underground portion of duct was removed, the ventilation rerouted, and the subterranean duct plugged with concrete.

Around the plaza perimeter, bricklaying was the focus in late July and early August. Masons have replaced virtually all the bottom courses extracted from the brick walls of the two libraries to make way for replacement of flashing and other waterproofing materials.

They’re also nearly done rebuilding and reconfiguring the walls that enclose the terrace. Formerly capped with a row of bricks laid upright — a so-called soldier course — the parapet wall is now topped with a beveled course of precast capstone, underlaid with flashing to keep moisture out of the bricks.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update returns in mid-July. In the meantime, we welcome your questions and comments about campus improvements, as well as funny propylene glycol anecdotes. Please e-mail Doug Hubley, stating “Construction Update” or “Don’t make a fuss, dear — I’ll have your sand, I love it!“ in the subject line.

Masons replace the base courses of brick on Ladd Library on a cloudy Aug. 1, 2018. The original bricks were removed to make way for the replacement of flashing in the library walls. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Carnegie Science Hall’s freshly overhauled air-handling plant returned to service on Thursday, Aug. 9.

A temporary HVAC unit about as big as a shipping container filled in for Carnegie’s penthouse installation during the three-week project.

“We did some initial testing on Tuesday, and we needed Wednesday to get everything else together,” said Chris Streifel, project manager for �ֲ���ý Facility Services. “Then at 6 a.m. Thursday, we turned off the temp unit, and never had to turn it back on.”

Complete with new fans, behind the louvers at right, and cooling coils, at left, this is the supply air chamber in the Carnegie Science Hall HVAC penthouse. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Posing with our biggest fan, here's the future home of Campus Construction Update, pictured on Aug. 9. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The folding table and stack of wallboard convey a sense of the counter-like collaboration table that will run between individual workspaces in the new �ֲ���ý Communications Office. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Once the door to Secretarial Services, where legions of seniors turned in their theses, this will become one of two entrances to the �ֲ���ý Communications Office. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Lowered from the roof and ready for removal, this construction debris was generated during the overhaul of Carnegie Science Hall's HVAC unit. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Refitted with new fans, coils for heating and cooling air, and other things that we have a harder time explaining, the system is running “just like it should be,” Streifel said this week. Technicians from Thayer Corp. and Dynamic Air Corp. will return next week for fine tuning, aiming to refine and balance the flows of air into and out of the building.

A Cote Corp. crane removed construction debris and tools from the roof of Carnegie Science on Aug. 2. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

“That could help control the air pressure in the building a little more tightly,” said Streifel. “Then we’ll do performance checks to confirm that we’ve hit our goals for what the system can do — how much air can we move through it, how much air can we chill, how much capacity do the new coils have?”

The two new coils, one for warming and one for cooling, use water to alter the temperature of air entering the building. The performance tests make use of instruments that measure airflow through the system, and temperatures of both air and water as they enter and leave the system. A mechanical engineer can use that data to calculate system performance. Streifel points out, though, that early testing suggests the system will meet or beat its goals.

Aside from that, the next couple of weeks will be spent training Facilities Services staff to run and maintain the system, and returning research operations that were relocated for the project to their rightful places. Somewhat later, the advent of heating season will necessitate another round of HVAC tests, as Carnegie is warmed by air from the unit. (The water for the heating and cooling coils is supplied independently of Carnegie’s tap water.)

A duct for incoming air dominates this access space to the Carnegie Science Hall HVAC unit. Photographed on Aug. 9, 2018, shortly before the unit was switched back on after a three-week overhaul. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Over the course of three 70-hour (or more) workweeks, the workers from Thayer and the subcontractors on the HVAC job “were amazing,” says Streifel. “They nailed it — really met every one of our expectations, and more.”

Now you’re in hot water: Carnegie must be blushing from all the attention it’s gotten this summer. Even as Thayer and DAC were going hammer and tongs on the HVAC work, plumbers for Damon Mechanical were wrapping up the replacement and expansion of Carnegie’s hot water service.

As we’ve reported, the goal was to both replace deteriorating pipes and add a whole new pipe complex that would convert the system into a recirculating loop, getting hot water to users faster.

In addition, the hot water storage tank was to be relocated from the first to the fifth floor, moving it near the water boiler. Together again for the first time! And finally, that gas-fired boiler was reconfigured for year-round use, replacing campus steam for making domestic hot water in Carnegie.

Four plumbers piping in Carnegie Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The tank-and-boiler work was completed in mid-July. Pipe installation and insulation got done during the week of July 30, making hot tap water available for the first time since early June. (Temporary hot water sources had been stationed in a few critical areas.)

Aside from cleanup, the final step here, too, was balancing the system — “adjusting valves so the water flows to the right locations,” explained Alan Kelley, �ֲ���ý’ manager for the project. That balancing act was performed this week.

The project was pleasantly free of surprises. The biggest challenge, if an entirely predictable one, was adjusting pipe courses to fit Carnegie’s crowded utility paths above ceilings, in closets, etc. “There’s just so much congestion with conduits, ductwork, exhaust hoods, and things like that,” Kelley explained.

Pipes and obstructions, Part II: We’ve learned more about an unexpected development in Kelley’s other large-scale summer project, the replacement of underground utilities along North Bardwell Street. We told you about the unmapped telecommunications conduit that forced a change in the routing for a section of new steam main.

As changes in plan so often do (making us dislike them all the more), this produced yet another wrinkle. In the original plan to replace the North Bardwell steam mains, all the old pipes would be abandoned in place. That’s because those pipes have asbestos insulation and removing them would require abatement.

Wouldn’t you just know it: The revised route for the new steam main between Wentworth Adams Hall and Olin Arts Center conflicts with those old pipes. So they’ll need to be yanked out and abated after all. That necessitates enclosing the street excavation with a tent, storing debris in sealed dumpsters, and other precautions. The experts of Acadia Contractors, of Turner, are at it now and should finish before school starts.

Closed since mid-June, this campus roadway providing access to Smith and Adams halls nevertheless opened for limited traffic last week, thanks to a base coat of asphalt applied early in the month. Asphalt pavements usually consist of a base coat and a top coat (which puts us in mind of the : “He’s the most tip-top / Top Coat”).

Grading North Bardwell Street on Aug. 1 prior to paving. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

But in this case, it doesn’t make sense to place the top coat until after the steam work, when the road is buttoned up for good. That will be the most effectual top coat.

Meanwhile, crews from Granite State Curbing Setters of Pembroke, N.H., were around plying their eponymous trade . The new curbs will make a nicer impression than the old concrete parking bumpers, although those do make good paperweights. And speaking of cosmetic touches, a crew from Davis Landscape Co. came up the road from Lisbon to begin work this week.

Phases and stages: Under construction since June, the new extension on the Coram Library porch will provide a much more spacious stage for �ֲ���ý officials to greet the campus community as school begins, just a few weeks hence.

New sod and paving have prettied up the construction site at Coram Terrace. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

With once-and-for-all completion of the Coram Terrace project now scheduled for later in September, as granite pavers are cut to order, the aim in the coming days is to make the porch functional and presentable for Opening Day on Aug. 27 and the Sept. 4 Convocation.

On the presentability front, Davis Landscape has bandaged construction scars with new sod; the construction fence has been removed; and new asphalt has restored Coram’s connections to campus walkways.

Functionality is just about there, too. On Aug. 6, the concrete artists of Sundown Construction Inc. poured a slab that will serve as the terrace floor until granite can be laid over it. We stopped by the following day, but the concrete was already too firm to scratch “CCU” into it and besides, it was covered with burlap that was wetted down periodically.

The Coram Terrace slab shortly after it was poured, on Aug. 6. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

After taking away the sharp stick we had planned to use for our initials, project manager Paul Farnsworth explained that the burlap helps regulate the moisture level in the concrete as it cures. As you’ll recall, maintaining the correct proportion of water relative to other ingredients is key to the chemical reaction that makes concrete strong. The prevailing hot weather made the burlap especially important.

The extension measures 70 by 15.5 feet, and is a little less than 30 inches high. Once a course of 6-inch granite blocks is laid around its perimeter, the newly embiggened porch will make an appealing perch. “It will be a nice place to sit and dangle your feet,” Farnsworth said.

Getting in on the ground floor: The ongoing creation of new quarters for the �ֲ���ý Communications Office on Lane Hall’s ground floor has entailed the remaking of several existing spaces that serve the entire building. And those facilities, which include a break room and a lactation room, are on track to reopen by the end of the month.

Shown with our biggest fan, here’s the future home of Campus Construction Update, pictured on Aug. 9. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Accompanied by Project Manager Shelby Burgau, we toured the worksite on Aug. 9. The common facilities were in various stages of near-completion: wallboard up and painted, flooring down, yet still awaiting ceiling tiles and such final touches as switchplates. A trash-staging room and an ADA-compliant bathroom are the other two facilities.

Getting those in-demand spaces back into service has been the top priority in the Lane project. Construction of the BCO area, meanwhile, is on schedule, with completion planned for November. In the month since our last visit, plenty of new wallboard had been hung, taped, and mudded, and there was visible progress on the utilities front that included the outdoor placement of a water chiller for BCO’s air-handling system. (We’re looking forward to hanging around the water chiller and gossiping.)

Providing ventilation for the BCO space, Burgau noted, has been one of the easy parts of dealing with subterranean Lane, which extends back under Alumni Walk and is rumored to include a former fallout shelter. As this section of basement lacks windows but does have a concrete shell insulated by earth, “we don’t have the various heating and cooling conditions that you would normally be working with.”

“That has been one of the biggest factors in this project, and it played into how we designed the HVAC system.”

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update welcomes your questions and comments about campus improvements and 1960s cartoons. Please e-mail news writer Doug Hubley, stating “Construction Update” or “Close friends get to call him T.C.” in the subject line.

Once the door to Secretarial Services, where legions of seniors turned in their theses, this will become one of two entrances to the �ֲ���ý Communications Office. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Campus is typically pretty quiet during the few weeks between Reunion and the advent of the �ֲ���ý Dance Festival in July. But if you can’t take the peace and quiet, this summer you’re in luck.

All you have to do is stand by the Class of 1932 Sundial in front of Coram Library. It’s a great spot to hear the roar and clatter as Almighty Waste hauls away the Ladd Library Terrace.

Shot from the roof of Carnegie Science at sunrise on the longest day of 2018, this image offers a bird’s-eye (rather a stand-offish bird, though) view of the Ladd Library Terrace in the midst of a hardscaping project. (Theophil Syslo/�ֲ���ý College)

This week, the Auburn-based, intriguingly named Almighty has had two or three green dumpsters at a time staged by an entrance to the terrace, and trucks keep coming onto campus to remove them as they’re filled.

What they’re carting away is a smelly mix of broken concrete pavers, sand, bricks, fibrous insulation, and other materials that were once layered over a water barrier underlying the plaza, which spans Ladd and Coram libraries. The water barrier is kaput, and, in one of the summer’s major construction projects at �ֲ���ý, the Massachusetts firm Contracting Specialists Inc. is replacing it.

Removing part of a wall on the Hedge Hall side of the library plaza. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Like moths to a flame, we’re irresistibly drawn to demolition. When we visited the site this week, the disarray was captivating. Aside from one patch of bricks, the pavement was all gone and much of the supporting material had also been scooped up and taken away. The old planters had been emptied and set disconsolately in one corner.

Making it look as hard as slicing a Jello salad, a mason used a power chisel to take down part of a chest-high brick wall on the side of the plaza facing Hedge Hall. That was one of the spots, Farnsworth explained, where some of the existing barred railing would be replaced with an attractive new cable barrier.

The other locations for the cable railing are at the flying staircase near Dan’s Beagle, and the alcove next to the giant forsythia bushes near Coram. (The forsythia, planted by former landscape architect Bill Bergevin to block an unsanctioned and erosion-prone shortcut, will be removed.)

That’s some rubble, Barney: Ladd Library Terrace on June 20, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The idea, Farnsworth said, is to open up sightlines onto the terrace, part of a campus-wide campaign to provide inviting perspectives into desirable spaces.

Getting back to bricks, Farnsworth had some interesting masonry facts to share as we contemplated Coram’s easterly wall, which faces Ladd and the terrace. He pointed out that the bricks that constitute the old library are 2 1/8 inches thick, an eighth-inch less than the more recent bricks on Ladd.

Another view of demolition on the Ladd-Coram library plaza. The concrete structure at center left is the “overrun” for an elevator: It contains some infrastructure and provides headroom above the elevator car. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Coram’s building envelope is all brick, three layers thick (this could turn into poetry if we worked a little harder at it … nah). The bricks are predominantly laid in a pattern called Flemish bond — bricks laid the long way alternating with the short way, aka “stretchers and headers.” Ladd’s pattern is the plain stretcher bond, bricks all set lengthwise.

The vaguely purplish or raspberry discoloration around the perimeter of some old bricks was caused by fumes from the charcoal the bricks were fired with back in the day. So if you want to give someone the raspberry, you can either make a rude noise or throw an old brick at them. New bricks, which are gas-fired, can have a brown perimeter that, as far as we know, has no nickname related to food.

The base of a Coram Library wall: metal flashing, a deteriorating layer of thick paper, bricks (some with raspberry-colored discoloration from firing), and, at bottom, a once-waterproof membrane that’s destined for replacement. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Farnsworth indicated a cardboard box of brick samples from Morin, the brick manufacturer over in Auburn. The samples will inform a custom order to replace a few courses of the outermost layer that have been removed at the foot of the Coram wall. Extracting them exposed old waterproofing measures: a confusing system of flashing and the no-longer-waterproof water barrier, which turns right up here like the edges of a tray.

Brick, you see, is porous, and water seeps down through it. (One of several reasons that brick umbrellas were a commercial failure.) The flashing and membrane at the foot of the wall were meant to divert the water toward drainage, Farnsworth explained — but the membrane now leaks, and the flashing wasn’t embedded deeply enough into the brickwork to work properly. All that will be corrected.

This machine will peel off an old, giant waterproofing membrane that underlies the Ladd Library Terrace. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

On June 25 or thereabouts, once the membrane is laid bare, a worker will ride around on a small machine that peels it off. Cracks in the double-decker concrete deck will be caulked. Then, following a site inspection by the manufacturer, The Henry Company of El Segundo, Calif., the new waterproofing will be laid and a new Dagwood sandwich of topping materials stacked over it.

Doors opening onto the terrace from both libraries will be set aside temporarily, as the waterproof layer will extend right into the entryways.

Shown on June 20, 2018, this trench on the Historic Quad side of Coram Library will be used for the foundation of an extension of the library’s porch. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

In the meantime, around on the other side of Coram, what’s happening with the extension of its famed porch, the scene of so many Commencements, Convocations, and midnight heart-to-hearts? There on the Historic Quad side of the building, there has appeared a construction fence — but you can slip around the left side of the porch to a pathway left open for building access.

From there you can admire a trench that’s been dug for a foundation footer and frost wall. The forms for the concrete will be placed next week. The footer and wall will support an on-grade concrete slab that will serve as the basis of the new extension. Big granite pavers will top it off, but that’s all some time away, as is the construction of new entries to the Ladd Terrace from the quad.

All that needs to be ready by Sept. 4 — Convocation, says Farnsworth.

Notes From Underground: When we drifted by North Bardwell Street at midday June 20, a crew from Peters Construction, of Buxton, Maine, was laying new water pipe near the Olin Arts Center driveway.

Old and new water-supply infrastructure along North Bardwell Street on June 20, 2018. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

In other words, having started 800 or 900 feet away at the Alumni Walk end of Bardwell last week, they were nearly done with that phase of the work. In fact, a welder on the scene estimated that the crew had only about 40 feet of water pipe left to lay.

Utilities work always comes with surprises, and there were two in this case, says �ֲ���ý project manager Alan Kelley. First, the old water pipe wasn’t as deep as it should have been — it was just above the 5-foot depth that minimizes risk from frost heaves.

So Peters and project contractor ATA went ahead and laid the new pipe 5 feet under — only to encounter a chunk of ledge on June 18. Maybe that was why the old pipe was too shallow. In any case, all it took was some jackhammer work (which, in fact, tends to be our remedy for any number of problems) to rectify the situation.

“Knock on wood, so far we haven’t run into any other obstacles,” Kelley said.

Shown on June 20, 2018, North Bardwell Street is newly shorn of its dense evergreen border. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

What comes next? After a weeklong break for the July 4th holiday, technicians for Texas-based Layne Inliner will start relining old clay sewer pipe along the street. And �ֲ���ý got a lucky break with that work, maybe as cosmic compensation for the ledge.

“We thought we were going to have to add a couple of sewer manholes,” Kelley notes, “but it turned out that there were some manholes already in the road that had been paved over.

“We’re guessing they were left from when that was a city street. So that’s going to save us a little bit of money.”

Formerly encompassing a break room and corridor in the Security and Campus Safety headquarters, this space is being converted to offices for �ֲ���ý’ transportation coordinator and electronic building access manager. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Keys and Rides: A project that just appeared on our radar is the renovation of the Security and Campus Safety building to accommodate two additional offices: Access Control, which provides key card–IDs and similar services, and new quarters for Kevin Plaisted, transportation coordinator.

Currently housed in Chase Hall, Plaisted and access manager Susan Nattress will move to the Security building, at the corner of College Street and Campus Avenue — which was a hobby shop, soda fountain, and commercial laundry, among other things, before �ֲ���ý owned it — in early August. Taking up underused space on the first floor, the renovation will also provide a new waiting area for students needing an ID or a ride in one of �ֲ���ý’ spiffy new all-electric Nissan Leafs. Shelby Burgau is the project manager.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update returns in mid-July. In the meantime, we welcome your questions, reminiscences and comments about campus improvements. Please e-mail  Doug Hubley, stating “Construction Update” or “What about brick raincoats?” in the subject line.

Box o’ bricks: Contemplating samples for a patch job in a Coram Library wall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)