Thunder Bay Construction Firm Is Working On A Prestigious 22 Million Dollar Project in Ottawa
By Scott A.Sumner
Thunder Bay Business
Thunder Bay based Manshield NWO Construction continues to grow and prosper with many large projects presently under way. Right now we are very busy. Last spring in 2006 was a slower part of the year for us but it picked up in the summer and fall. states Peter Belluz, President of Manshield NWO. Last year the company worked on several smaller projects including the addition and renovation to the TBaytel building, the Canada Games Complex family change rooms, renovations to
Birchwood Terrace which is a long term care facility in Kenora and at the Dryden High School doing mechanical and electrical upgrades and some architectural upgrades in the classrooms.
Last fall we started on the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre Research Centre after winning the construction management contract of the 1st phase and tenant improvements. The work is quite complicated with the labs requiring special mechanical and electrical components. One lab has a 99.9% HEPA air filtration system installed with a contractor out of Toronto. There are special facilities to care
for the animals used in the research. The building has 45,000 square feet of usable space for the researchers, notes Belluz. We are also looking at some renovations to the nurses residences and the concrete bunkers.
Another project currently under construction for Manshield is the addition and renovations to the Sacred Heart School, a $8.6 million budget adding a gym and additional classrooms. The school board has moved the students that were attending there to FW Collegiate school for one year. When the project is complete this summer those students will move back to that facility.
The addition and renovation to St Judes School on Ogden Street is also underway by Manshield where they are constructing some new classrooms at a cost of just over $1 million dollars. Also coming up is the Alqonquin School by the method of construction management including adding a gym, moving the library over and renovating some classrooms.
Finally Manshield is getting ready to do renovations to the Bark Lake School in Dryden. It was a closed school so they are reopening it for the use of the French students at a renovation cost of $800,000.
A significant project for Peter Belluz of Manshield is the $22 million Porters Luxury Retirement Facility on the Rideau River in Ottawa owned by the Reichman family. They are partial owners of some homes in Thunder Bay and that is how we got introduced to them and invited to put in a proposal. We were successful last summer in quite a bid process that came over budget with the first tender, states
Belluz.
Working with the owners we were able to take over 10% out of the budget with out any significant design changes. We did some value engineering exercises in the mechanical, electrical systems and some of the finishes that were specified and were successful in getting alternate products approved that were just as high quality as the
original specified materials.
How is it working on a $22 million project sofar from Thunder Bay?
We got to know some of the local subtrades in Ottawa and partnered with them on the process. We also had some local input with some of our business acquaintances in Ottawa. This office has always done work through out Ontario with jobs in Toronto, SS Marie, Sudbury, Kenora and Dryden so it is not that much of a departure. This is a signature project though- a luxury retirement residence with a penthouse, a lounge, library, theatre, swimming pool and spa so it is a really nice
facility with views of the Rideau River opening in March 2008., notes Belluz. We are busy but we have had to traveling in order to maintain the level of work that we have had.
For the rest of the year I am cautiously optimistic about our construction economy. There are some good projects coming out. One project we are working on is the McKellar Hospital redevelopment. Once all the approvals are in place we hope to get working on that project later this year. It would involve tearing down the older parts of the hospital and constructing a new retail development to the north side of
the property. The existing building on the south side would be retained for office and retirement home development, indicates Belluz.
There will be a Shoppers Drug Mart of some 17,000 square feet there which is their prototype store. We are confident with the site with Shoppers so will build an additional 5000 to 7000 square feet. We hope to construct the new Memorial Ave Shoppers as well.
