NCDOT Board Tours New Facility on Oct 5, 2011

the Board rode in on a chartered bus

http://www.ncdot.org/about/board/
http://www.ncdot.gov/about/leadership/secretary.html

AppalCART and Facility Overview

SYSTEM OVERVIEW
AppalCART is the public transportation system serving the town of Boone, Watauga County and Appalachian State University. Established in January 1980 as the Watauga County Transportation Authority, AppalCART provides fixed-route, paratransit, demand-response and subscription service.

The majority of AppalCART’s ridership is on the fare-free fixed-routes serving the Appalachian State University community and the general public in the Boone area. AppalCART operates 10 routes Monday through Friday, five of which operate until 11:00 p.m., as well as three daytime routes on Saturdays and three evening routes on Sundays during spring and fall semesters at ASU. The system also offers complimentary paratransit service to individuals certified with disabilities that prevent them from using the fixed routes for certain trips.

Vehicle Fleet:
31 passenger vehicles including:
• Two hybrid 35’ transit buses that arrived in June 2011
• 15 rear-engine transit buses
• 14 rural paratransit service vehicles

FY 2011 Ridership and Operating Statistics:
• 1,352,429 passenger trips – 13% more than FY 2010 – a record for the system
• 54,326.90 hours of service – 6.8% more than FY 2010
• 725,810 miles of service – 6.9% more than FY 2010
• 176,161 miles of van service resulting in 16,148 one-way trips.
• 48,159 miles of paratransit service resulting in 14,769 trips – 31% more than FY 2010

ADMINISTRATIVE AND MAINTENANCE FACILITY
AppalCART was awarded $5.5 million through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to construct a 24,000 square-foot administrative/maintenance facility that will enable the rapidly growing transit system to continue to operate an efficient, reliable transportation network. A $4.1 million contract was awarded to McCarroll Construction on May 29, 2009 for the facility, which is currently being constructed on an eight-acre site owned by AppalCART off the N.C. 105 Bypass.

The facility is anticipated to obtain LEED Silver certification and currently has enough points to be certified as Gold. Environmentally-friendly features include a rainwater containment system that will catch runoff and use it to wash buses, a solar panel system to heat water for domestic and radiant floor heat, and low-flow showers and toilets in locker rooms.

Project Delays
Economic conditions caused several subcontractors on the project that had already been paid, including funding for their vendors, to go out of business. As a result, McCarroll Construction had to pay vendors that would have been paid by the subcontractors, causing a hardship on the construction company. McCarroll Construction was unable to pay their subcontractors and vendors during the spring of 2011 and the subcontractors refused to return to the job site. AppalCART made an arrangement with McCarroll Construction’s attorney to make monthly payments to the attorney so that they can pay the subcontractors and vendors. Mediation between AppalCART and McCarroll Construction occurred on Aug. 25 and settlement in the amount of $300,000 was agreed upon to be paid to McCarroll Construction for General Conditions beyond what had been stated in the contract. It was also agreed that the project would be completed by Nov. 23, 2011 otherwise liquidated damages of $800 per day will be enforced.

Current Status
McCarroll is back on the project work site and interior floors are being completed at this time. The project is about 85% complete with remaining tasks including finishing the interior, opening the septic system, turning on the water, installing the maintenance equipment, completing the paving of a parking lot and installing bus canopies. Change orders in the amount of $1,167,883 have brought the project total to $5,267,883.

Jennifer Garifo
Communications Officer
N.C. Department of Transportation
Communications Office
1 South Wilmington Street
Raleigh, N.C. 27601
(919) 733-2522
(919) 733-9980 fax
jgarifo@ncdot.gov

AppalCART Director Chris Turner and Secretary of Transportation Gene Conti

For AppalCART's new facility - Project Manager Patrick Beville and Architect David Patrick Moses

AppalCART Building Maintainance Manager Randall Fletcher

Bob Collier and Chris Turner

Beville, Moses, Turner, and Fletcher

High Country Press article

http://www.highcountrypress.com/weekly/2011/09-01-11/appalcart-transit-center.htm
SEPTEMBER 1, 2011 ISSUE

The AppalCART Transit Center on the N.C. 105 Bypass in Boone was originally slated for completion in July 2010, but progress has been delayed. The complex is currently about 85 percent complete, according to AppalCART Transportation Director Chris Turner.

“It’s still under construction,” Turner said. “Little things are going on inside; not much is going on outside.”

On August 25, “we had a major mediation between the AppalCART project management team and McCarroll Construction team—general contractor for the job,” Turner said.

Attorney A. Holt Gwyn mediated the all-day meeting that was arranged in order to “hear the general contractor’s financial needs and to state our thoughts on the debts incurred,” Turner said.

He explained that “some of their subcontractors went out of business, so they incurred debts that were not responsibility normally of the owner.

“They were able to keep a full schedule through March and April, then things slowed down,” he said.

To get the project back in full swing, “we are going to need spending authority from the state, and they’re going to need spending authority through their bonding company,” he said.

He expects “both to come through,” but said that “it’s going to take a month or two before things are going full blast again.”

Funded by about $5.5 million through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the energy-efficient building “will allow the fleet [of AppalCART vehicles] to operate more effectively” and will also be “a rather attractive complex,” Turner said.

The approximately 24,000-square-foot building designed by architect David Patrick Moses will consist of office space and a maintenance area. It will be LEED-certified and will feature foam insulation as well as “solar water heaters to help heat the floor of the shop,” Turner said.

The solar panels will be visible from the highway, he added.

“When we finish it, it will be a real asset to the community,” he said.

The initial pavement has been done for about two-thirds of the parking lot, and the awnings for the fleet of vehicles stand as the “largest remaining part to do,” Turner said.

“I’m hopeful we’ll be in there by Christmas,” he said, adding that it is “just a hope at this point” and could be sooner or later.

In the meantime, he said he is grateful that AppalCART has its office at 274 Winkler’s Creek Road out of which to operate.

For more information about AppalCART, click to www.appalcart.com or call 828-264-2278

new AppalCART Facility on Hold

This blog hasn't been updated since April 29, 2011, because all the news on our new facility is bad. Our contractor, McCarroll Construction ran out of money. The article below just appeared in the Watauga Democrat August 21, 2011.

http://www2.wataugademocrat.com/News/story/New-AppalCART-facility-on-hold---id-005927

Roughly two years after construction began on the new AppalCART facility on the N.C. 105 Bypass, work has stalled due to the contractor's financial difficulties. McCarroll Construction, based in Arden, began approaching AppalCART around March trying to collect more capital so it could continue the project, transportation director Chris Turner said.

Now, AppalCART is considering starting mediation with the contractor next week to figure out how to move forward.

Representatives of McCarroll Construction did not return several messages by presstime Thursday.

The delay has caused AppalCART to go through its budget for legal services, request an extension for its federal stimulus money and push back its ever-changing opening date.

“The timeline’s sort of out the window until we get the mediation done, and then it will still be ‘iffy,’” Turner said. Work began at the property in summer 2009, with the goal of finishing a 23,000-square-foot, LEED-certified center with offices, maintenance bays and ample parking.
The $5.5 million budget was covered by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, although AppalCART contributed its own reserves for early site work and purchasing the property. McCarroll’s bid came in at $4.1 million, but several change orders have upped the final cost estimate to about $5.3 million, Turner said. While the building itself is “probably 90 percent done,” Turner said, the facility lacks several important pieces. Materials are onsite to construct steel parking lot canopies, which will cover the lots where many of the vans and buses will park to offer protection from damaging rain and snow. The canopies will also allow drivers to inspect their vehicles without being exposed to inclement weather. Portions of the parking lot also need to be paved, and elevators need to be tested, Turner said. The interior needs finish flooring, a phone system and a two-way radio system to communicate with buses.A solar water heating system also has not yet been installed on the roof, he said.

The facility has passed several anticipated openings: early 2011, then April 2011, then June and finally mid-July. Now, Turner is hoping to be in the new space before mid-December.

As the project stretched longer than expected, the contractor’s budget for general conditions and overhead simply ran out, he said.

AppalCART and the N.C. Department of Transportation audited McCarroll Construction to ensure its expenses were legitimate and found that the company’s books were in order, Turner said.

They also applied for a grant extension for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act money, which Turner expects will be approved.

AppalCART had $1,500 budgeted for legal costs last year and “spent probably three or four times that amount in the last fiscal year,” he said.

The parties are now seeing whether they can come to an agreement or whether the bonding company needs to take the reins. A lawsuit is always a possibility, Turner said, although he anticipated that mediation would be successful.

Until the matter is settled, AppalCART continues to operate its routes from the existing facility at 274 Winklers Creek Road. The routes had already switched to new start times in anticipation of buses leaving from the new facility, but Turner said making those new times work will not be a problem.

Turner said the AppalCART staff is eagerly anticipating the chance to show off the facility’s functionality and beauty and move out of the cramped building where they have been for 27 years.

“It’s something that’s going to be resolved, but it’s going to take some time,” he said.

Facility, ARRA, Artists

The AppalCART facility is still under construction, hoping for a mid-July 2011 move-in date.


Artists Keith Lambert and Willie Baucom installing their work.
ShipYard EarthWorks

click to biggify read about Art-In-Transit

AppalCART Director Chris Turner, Architect (smiling) David Patrick Moses

(black shirt in rear and blue shirt in rear)
DavidW and Terry Davis of McCarroll Construction


AppalCART's Mike Norwood, Randall Fletcher, Tim Townsend, Michelle Brewer, Chris Shook, and Chris Turner in photo.

Willie Baucom positioning the ARRA medallion.

AppalCART's new facility was built with American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding.

Turner, Cook, Brewer, Gates, and Shook

Here kitty, kitty...

AppalCART now is the proud owner of a BobCat skid-steer loader. Will be used mostly by Randall for blowing snow, sweeping the parking lots, and unloading heavy pallets at the new facility. Move in date is scheduled for June 15th.

New Facility Photo

We're hoping to move in June 2011. Gotta a little more snow last night.

Facility and Snow Update

Ray at Ray's Weather says we've got more snow coming, and it's gonna snow through next Tuesday. We've got a bet going when Watauga County Schools will be back in session.

ASU Chancellor's Card, snowdrift, new facility photo's

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Wed Dec 15th - snowdrift outside our present facility. Today, Fri Dec 17th - is by far the mildest weather we've had in a couple of weeks.
Ray'sWeather
Date Snowfall (inches)
November 4-6 trace
December 1 trace
December 4-5 3.0"
December 5-7 6.0"
December 12-14 9.5"

Total Ice & Snow 18.5"



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Director Chris Turner took some photo's of AppalCART's new facility. We hope to move in April 2011.