After looking forward to getting the ball rolling on the Transfer Station renovations, contractors discovered hidden issues when removing the old compactor which will lead to a further delay in completion.
On Monday, Jan. 20, contractors assigned to replace the old compactor, in what workers at the station call “the pit,” found problems involving the steel flooring and some of the infrastructure of the chute.
After discovering these issues, contractors stopped immediately and the architect was called to send a structural engineer to evaluate the problems and create a plan to fix them. Once the plan is in place a steel company will need to be hired to make the corrections.
Director of Public Health, Andrew Petty explained at Monday’s Board of Health meeting he is working to coordinate each of the companies to complete their jobs immediately one after the other. He added the compactor company typically books a month in advance, therefore he hopes to have all problems fixed before the compactor company makes their return.
Board of Health Member, Tom McMahon compared the issue to making repairs in an old home.
“I was comparing it to living in a historic house,” McMahon, said, “We just renovated it and you think it’s going to go easy and then you open a wall and you realize, wait a minute sticks is holding this house together.”
This has been a recurring problem in Marblehead as the same issue happened with the Marblehead High School roof. Once designers were able to access the roof, they found further issues with the HVAC systems which is leading to the delay in a roof replacement.
McMahon explained the compactor was very old and throughout its life span of 20 years, giant trucks have been disposing of heavy and large amounts of waste. Over time the repeated action has caused the infrastructure to deteriorate in different ways.
Although these repairs will come at a cost, there is a “revolving fund that is decently padded,” according to McMahon. The fund is made exactly for situations similar to this, any unaccounted-for costs that may come up once the project gets underway.
“We have a waste revolving account that we’re using for the construction projects,” said Petty, “My estimate is $50,000 max (for the repairs).”
An exact timeline was not given for the repairs, but the Board of Health is hopeful it will be resolved soon.
“It’s an urgent thing,” McMahon said, “because every day we‘re losing money if we don’t do it. I have to imagine it’s trying to get done real quick.”
In the meantime, the residential area of the transfer station is still open for trash and recycling as well as the recycling area for any commercial companies with a permit.