In a final discussion this year, Riverside trustees reviewed two-dimensional schematics for the village’s project to remodel its public safety building, including new community spaces, access to a riverwalk patio and a dedicated office for the village president.
After approving a contract in May for detailed floor plans in addition to exterior renderings coming next year with Williams Architects, the firm that provided planning work on the project, the board on Nov. 6 agreed to move forward with the second of three detailed plans they looked at, which all shared similarities. Williams will return to the board early next year with further updates and refinements on the plans based on three-dimensional modeling.
“The community space in all of these schemes is front and center,” said Kim Nigro, a project manager at Williams. “There is an open space that has both access and views all the way through to the river and connection to the proposed riverwalk element patio that is connecting all the way back to the suspension bridge.”
Each layout has 50 on-site parking spaces between basement parking in the back of the building, as the ground slopes downward toward the river, and surface parking out front, Nigro said.
“All three schemes have some variation of the same set of programs. The only thing that changes from one to the next, really, is the relationship upstairs,” she said.
One key difference from the first scheme to the second and third is the location of fire department facilities on the main floor. In the first scheme, those spaces run north to south between the police space by the westerly front entrance and the apparatus bay for Riverside’s firetrucks, and in the other two, they’re on the east side of the apparatus bay and separated from the village’s police facilities.
“One of the things we really focus on with fire planning is the decontamination of personnel. When they’re coming back from a structure fire, they have carcinogens on their uniform,” Nigro said. “We always create this buffer zone, kind of an airlock, between that apparatus, the hot zone, and we call this a warm zone. They’re taking off soiled gear; they’re showering and cleaning that gear in this warm zone before they move into the zone of administrative or living spaces.”
The second and third schematics differ in the layout of rooms on the main and second level, with main floor spaces for administrative assistants who interact with the public, a public conference room, bathrooms and the new village president’s office shifting in position and size between the schemes. On the second floor, the locations of various community amenities like a fitness space and locker rooms, a community kitchen and support space for Riverside TV shift around, too.
In all three schematics, fire department living spaces are on the second floor, separated from the community areas by the apparatus bay. In the first scheme, they run along the south wall with bunk rooms having direct views of the river, while in the second and third, they run along the east wall above the “warm zone” Nigro described.
Public Safety Director Matthew Buckley told the board all three schematics would be viable for his two departments’ needs.
“When they first started coming out, these plans, [Public Works Director] Dan [Tabb] and I sat in one of our offices with scissors and cut up little shapes and moved them around to try to plan all this. We gave it back to Williams and said, ‘Hey, this is what we came up with,’ and they were like, ‘Makes a lot of sense.’ It flowed a lot better,” Buckley said. “All of these plans flow pretty well for us, which is why they’re up here. We are pretty happy with how all three of these schemes have turned out.”
He said having the warm zone between police spaces and the apparatus bay or on the far east side of the bay would both suffice for Riverside’s firefighters.
“Either way is fine with us, but it is nice having that separated area for dirty equipment,” he said.
Village Manager Jessica Frances said she suggested creating a new business district designation over the new facility if it is approved and built.
“We could assess a 1% business district tax. Why is that important? Well, if we’re entering into agreements with caterers to allow them to use the community space for catering, we get that 1% business district tax,” Frances said. “We can reinvest in the facility, or we can use that money to actually abate the property taxes for the referendum.”
That business district designation could also apply to a possible store selling smoothies or coffee that could open on the second floor as a designated social space for Riverside’s teenagers who no longer want to congregate in the library.
“Williams did an awesome job, and there is a small little space that would be enough,” Frances said. “If we weren’t successful in having a cafe-type shop set up there, then it could just be utilized as additional space.”
Members of the board agreed all three schemes could work, though Trustee Elizabeth Kos spoke in favor of the second scheme, which gave the firefighter living spaces the most distance from the other rooms on the second floor.
“I like that the bunk rooms are a little more secluded,” she said. “Maybe that affords a little more quiet, a little more sense of not being in the middle of it all, so I like that.”
Williams representatives said they had heard the feedback they needed from the board.
“If everyone’s in agreement that [the three schemes] are functioning pretty well programmatically, and we take your comments from tonight, the next step of looking at this as a mass is starting to refine some of these things,” Nigro said. “When we’re looking at the apparatus support bay on the east versus internally, one of those options may become more obviously the solution based on how we look at this three-dimensionally. That’s what we’re going to come back to you next with.”
