Moving Day and a Handy Location Guide!

Renewal construction updates (almost) as they happen, for the week of Feb. 22, 2016.

Final preparations are being completed to pave the way for ALL of our staff to move into their temporary spaces in the school wing for the balance of Phase 1 construction. So we’d like to take this opportunity to give you a glimpse of where all your favourite Temple people will be located. And, perhaps more importantly, how you will get there.

Bell has now completed its work and our telephone supplier is in the process of installing our new system. Our mover will be here on March 10th and we anticipate that everything will be finished the next day. From March 11th onward, we will begin using our new entrance to Temple – a new accessible ramp from the Ava Road parking lot leading to a new set of doors (just slightly west of the old doors) and then directly into the Boardroom foyer.

Once inside this bright new space (it will also be the temporary home of our Sisterhood gift shop) you’ll be able to move throughout the school wing either via our brand new elevator, which you can access right beside our new temporary security desk (relocated from its old location), or by way of the stairs at the south-west corner of the building. These stairs can be accessed directly by walking through the Boardroom and using new temporary door on the west side of the space.

• All of our Clergy and their support staff, as well as the Foundation and Membership offices, will be temporarily located on the north and west sides of the 3rd floor.
• All of our Education offices (including the Early Childhood Centre and Religious School professionals) will be housed on the south side of the 2nd floor.
• Our general Administration offices (including our Executive Director) can be found on the north wing of the ground floor. You an access these offices by going down to the lower level and coming up the new, north stairwell … OR … by going up to the 2nd floor via the south-west stairs (or the elevator) and coming back down the new north staircase, to the 1st floor.

During the first few weeks following the move, members of our admin staff will take turns helping congregants and guests find their way from the security desk to their destinations. And simple wayfinding signage will be installed soon, to help you get to where you’re going.

We encourage you to stop in once we get settled and visit us in our new spaces. As a reminder, these moves (and all of the preparatory work of Phase 1) will enable us to remain on-site throughout Phase 1 construction so we can continue all of the programs and activities you’ve come to love. The balance of Phase 1 construction will include the creation of our transformative, sunlit Central Atrium, our new Family Chapel, coffee shop, Youth Lounge and so much more – in a LEED Silver certified, environmentally friendly building.

To that point, our Building Committee, with the guidance of our architect and our cost consultant, has reviewed the bids from the six pre-qualified general contractor firms bidding to oversee construction of the balance of Phase 1 and is engaged in a value-engineering exercise with the contractor that submitted the best bid. As first noted in our mid-December construction update, this is an ongoing process, which we expect will take another month or so to complete. Our aim is to reduce the cost of the rest of Phase 1 construction, as the bids came in higher than anticipated, when measured against the estimates prepared by our cost consultant.

Once again, thanks to all for your continued support of our Renewal Project. For the most up to date photos and video of construction in progress, please click here.