Residents watching construction progress at Waterford village
Dan Carter
Allan Halleck knows that he and his crew are being closely watched. He knows that if there is something that just doesn’t look right, he will hear about it on Friday morning.
Halleck is the JE Dunn Construction project manager on the Waterford at Fairway Village project in east Vancouver, Wash. The Portland general contractor is just finishing Phase II and is close to finishing Phase III of the senior retirement community.
“Every Friday we have a meeting that is open to all of the residents here at the village where we describe what we have done in the preceding week and what we will be doing in the coming one,” says Halleck. “Usually 20 to 30 residents show up and are very interested in the construction process.
“And from some of the tougher questions it is obvious that a number of the residents have been spending a lot of time at their windows. They will ask why we did something in a certain order or why we used a piece of machinery for one part of a job and not for another.”
At the meetings Halleck gets to use some of his architectural training as he draws detailed pictures of a certain aspect of the job while superintendents Jeff Schmidt and Rich Forayter give the verbal explanations.
“We have also been attending the monthly (meetings) the residents have on Friday afternoons,” Halleck adds. “We have felt very honored to be invited to these special occasions. Between these and the regular Friday morning meetings, some of these residents have become real friends.”
Phase I of the Waterford at Fairway Village, owned by Touchmark Living Centers, was completed in January 1998. It offers three different living choices: a main building with apartments, assisted living apartments and custom designed cottages. The Waterford Mall in the main building also offers a coffee and ice cream shop, theater, chapel, bank and beauty salon.
Phase II consists of a two-story, 48,000-square-foot, wood-frame structure with 60 living units built around an enclosed outdoor courtyard. It is an assisted living and Alzheimer’s disease facility.
Phase III, the four-story, 81,000-square-foot independent living and senior health and fitness center, will open in July. The top three floors will feature one- and two-bedroom apartments while the ground floor will have a fitness center with a four-lane indoor pool, spa, workout rooms, medical examination rooms and a physical therapy room. A unique aspect of the fitness center is that it will be open to community membership.
“We want the health and fitness center to have a health club atmosphere for our residents and community residents as well,” says Waterford Executive Director Pat Bergin. “We know that senior health centers are the fastest growing section of the health club industry. We will have a top-notch facility here and we want the community to be able to take advantage of it.”
Copyright 2002 Dolan Media Newswires
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