The Ad-hoc Library Expansion Building Committee has been looking at changes to the E.C. Scranton Memorial Library renovation plan to keep the project on budget and now, with new architect Drummey Rosane Anderson, Inc. (DRA) under contract, the committee and architect recently presented the Library Board of Trustees with a modified—but not final—renovation plan.

The voter-approved renovation plan for the E.C. Scranton Memorial Library is a scaled-down version of the plan that Madison voters narrowly defeated in a 2008 referendum vote. Approved designs for the building work to preserve the historical architecture while improving the streetscape and expanding the floor plan. The square footage of the building will jump from 17,000 to 37,000 and a 45-space parking lot will be added.

The project to renovate the library is estimated to cost $15 million, but due to substantial grants and fundraising efforts, the library asked the town to bond for $9.1 million. The library had been working with LLB Architects prior to the referendum, but once the bond was passed and the committee entered into contract negotiations, the two parties struggled to come to terms.

According to Library Director Beth Crowley, one of the major problems with LLB was its schematic design. When an independent cost estimate was developed after the referendum, the plan for the library would have exceeded the approved budget by about $2.5 million.

“We want to stay as true to what the voters voted on in February—certainly the use of the building, how it flows, how it functions, is very important,” Crowley said previously. “There are certain things we absolutely have to have,” and then can find ways to meet the budget by “looking at what can be scaled back or what can just be done differently or more effectively.”

Knowing that the library has to hit the town budget, new DRA architect Ken Best presented the Board of Trustees with a plan similar to the one approved at referendum, but with a few notable changes.

“The project is moving along very quickly, which is our primary goal,” he said. “It’s a work in process, so what you are seeing is really a status report…We are really simplifying the building and not having a lot of jigs and jogs. It will be much cleaner and hopefully the plan is we will be saving money by simplifying the structure and simplifying the way the building is constructed.”

The basic design of the building is still relatively the same with designated spaces for children, teens, the Friends of the Library, two entrances and exits that lead through the building, and a separate community room that can be separated from the building for potential use outside of main library hours. However, the placement and use of some of the additional buildings connected to the library project like the Post Office building (the white house) and the Hull building have changed.

The Post Office building in the original design was going to be brought forward to line up with the streetscape on Wall Street, but after conversations with the Department of Transportation (DOT) concerning car entrance to the library property, the Post Office is now going to be pushed back off the main road.

“There was feedback from DOT that wanted a two-way entrance from Wall Street, so that has driven the location of that building,” said Best. “In order to accommodate that two-way drive, the Post Office couldn’t go in that spot; it had to move toward the back.”

The new building will have an entrance and exit on Wall Street and the current entrance on the Post Road will become a one-way entrance only to help with the flow of traffic and emergency access.

The Hull Building

In addition to changing the Post Office location, the library is looking to demolish the Hull Building because estimates have shown the building is too costly to try to save.

The original idea was to use all of the Hull Building in the new library, but once consultants determined the building cannot carry the required load for library book stacks and that floors and windows are out of alignment, the plan moved to just saving the façade of the building. However, now the committee says despite the historical nature of the façade, the structure is old and in too poor of shape to be saved without spending a significant amount of money, according to Library Committee and trustee member Henry Griggs. Griggs said the trick will be proving to the state historic preservation office that there is no financially feasible way to save that building.

“The problem with the Hull Building is just a more intense example of something we are running into, which is reality and a budget over and over again,” he said. “…We are going to have to make some explanations, but I think the simple answer is we tried every feasible alternative and we wound up having to take down a building that wasn’t too terribly well built in the first place.”

Some trustee members were concerned about taking down the Hull Building and changing the streetscape from what was approved at referendum, but Crowley said the new façade in place of the Hull building will look similar to the historic building.

“It will be a nod to what was there,” she said. “It won’t be an exact replication of the Hull Building, but what we have challenged the architect to give a nod to what the historical streetscape looked like. What it will actually accomplish is some cost savings, but it will actually function better than retaining any aspect of the Hull building would have is the bottom line.”

Next Steps

With the modified design in hand, the project now has to go to a cost estimator to determine if the new design hits the necessary budget. Both Crowley and Best said the hope is to have those estimates back sometime in late December.

“It still has to go to the cost estimator, which is why the designs are still somewhat preliminary, and we may have to cut back if we find we are still over budget,” she said.