Wishcamper Center has Grand Opening on October 16

Over 200 people, including Maine politicians, helped to open the new Wishcamper Center at USM on October 16, 2008.  The new center houses the Muskie School of Public Policy and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. The Wishcamper building is one of the projects that Wright-Ryan is doing for USM’s University Commons in addition to the Osher Map Library expansion and renovation, Glickman Library renovations and significant sitework in order to create a cohesive campus community. The building has been submitted for approval as a LEED Gold building.  The four-story, 59,000 square feet facility incorporates a curtainwall system and state of the art, energy efficient mechanical systems and geothermal in addition to a green roof. The architect was Koetter Kim & Associates, Inc.

Hathaway Creative Center by Tom Frederick, V.P. of Operations at Wright-Ryan

Years after the last Hathaway shirts were made the rebirth of the Hathaway Center in Waterville is now complete thanks to the incredible efforts of our team members. On November 3rd, Maine General Health occupied the third floor of this incredible mill building on the Kennebec River after a sprint to the finish by upwards of 150 construction workers.

After a lengthy preconstruction period WR started cleaning out the old mill building and installing new windows in late winter of 2008. Structural renovations started in the spring. As summer loomed, work on the new wall framing had to stop due to changes which were being negotiated between the owner and Maine General. Numerous meetings were held to coordinate the drawings and determine the most cost effective way to execute the work. On August 5th the final drawings were received by WR but little did we know of the challenge to come.

Maine General, which is one of the largest hospital and medical service providers in the state, has had staff located in Waterville for years. They were occupying space in several different buildings throughout downtown Waterville. Unbeknownst to us, several of the leases for these properties expired on November 1, 2008. The owners of the Hathaway Mill approached WR and asked us to do the near impossible – take a shell of an old mill building that had no boiler plant, HVAC system, elevator, electrical system, walls, flooring, etc. and made it habitable in a little over 12 weeks!

Because of who we are and our dedication to our clients and because we saw that both the owner and Maine General were in a tough spot we accepted the challenge. We had a series of meetings with our subcontractors and developed an extremely aggressive set of milestones. We also met with City of Waterville officials and told them of our predicament. They cooperatively worked with us in developing a minimum set of life safety requirements in order to occupy the building. The last few weeks were a blur of activity as construction lasted up to 18 hours a day.  The end result was the exactly what the owner and Maine General needed. They were able to vacate their old leases and take up residence in their beautiful new space.

Special mention needs to go to our team members who helped execute this great challenge. They include Bruce Morgan and Dan Chipman, Superintendents, Chuck Hardes, Assistant Superintendent, Sam Perry, Gary Phillips, Al Messier, and Jody Belliveau, Field Carpenters, John Moynihan, Project Engineer, Mike White, Project Manager and Dave Onos, General Superintendent. Our hats go off to all these guys for a job well done.

Work will continue in the mill for several more months as WR continues to complete other areas of the building including 66 apartments on the 4th and 5th floors and new tenant space on the 1st and 2nd floor including new office space for TD Banknorth.