High Valley Transit’s new $46 million headquarters near Silver Summit is on track to hit its planned opening in May, and the days are numbered for the group’s makeshift tent facility across from Ecker Hill Middle School off Interstate 80.Executive Director Caroline Rodriguez and Operations Direc tor Brad Herkimer last week toured the nearly finished facilities, which span 8 acres and include three buildings: one 18,000-square foot building for administration, one 17,000-square-foot building for maintenance and one 31,000-square-foot building for storage. They sit in a row off U.S. 40 near Home Depot.The headquarters in 2022 were initially estimated to cost around $27 million. That increased by $2.7 million after crews encountered bedrock during construction, which required them to blast the material instead of excavating it. With the cost of other additions like electric charging and nine living units, the total reached its current $46 million tag.Previously, the transit group had estimated the future site could open in late 2023 following its October 2022 groundbreaking. The construction delays pushed the original 18-month timeline back, eventually landing on an estimated opening in March 2025. Now, the May finish line seems real as the facilities receive finishing touches.  “I told Gabe he’s sending those ice machines back.” Rodriguez said to Herkimer. The two had minutes earlier looked through the maintenance break room where a large, boxy machine was over a lip. “We’re not moving in with janky stuff hanging off the counter.”Rodriguez, a transportation veteran with years of experience in rural transit across, was matter of fact. This is their one chance to get everything right, after all. The public transportation group has been working out of a makeshift tent and construction trailer across from Ecker Hill Middle School beside Interstate 80 since 2021, and, well, they’ve made do, Herkimer said.“When we launched in 2021, we had to kind of make do with the space that the county could give us,” Herkimer said. “And Ecker Hill Park and Ride was really the biggest space that they could provide us. So of course, we grew, and that trailer grew. We went from a single trailer to two trailers to a triple-wide.”That trailer is currently stuffed. The new facility has what they need and more: plenty of office space, open conference rooms and break rooms. There’s an open-office area for “driver support specialists” where they can see real-time info on a trio of TV screens at the front of the room:“When (the driver support specialists) are talking to riders or people who are asking questions about the service, they can quickly zoom in and zoom out of maps and say, ‘Hey, yeah, your bus should be there in five minutes.’ Or, ‘Yeah, I can. I can send a micro vehicle to your location.’” Of note are nine living space units in the administration building’s upstairs for employees to lease and live in — or, possibly, stay the night in after a long day or in the event of a snow day. Rodriguez said they did this in consideration of the high cost of living in the county. This increased the facility’s price tag — and for good reason.“I think everybody who tries to find employees up here knows it’s impossible to find employees because who can afford to live up here?” Rodriguez said. “Part of the motivation too is that we want our staff to be able to live in the community in which they work, to the extent that that’s possible. And since we were already building a brand-new building, it made sense to build the housing.”The maintenance building has four full-size bus bays and one bay with slots for smaller vehicles at the end. Fuel lines run across the ceiling into nozzles that can be pulled down from above. Petroleum, oils and lubricants are stored near the edge of the building with a door for suppliers to easily access and restock. “This will make it much more efficient and safe for our mechanics and our operators,” Herkimer said. The third building will house up to 24 full-size buses. There are big, bay windows letting in natural light, which helps cut down on utility costs. When they have the money, there’s space next to it for a second bus barn, Herkimer said. The area also includes space for charging electric buses. A third of the High Valley Transit fleet is already electric, and the barn is plumbed to go electrical if they increase that fraction. It’s all designed with wisdom gained from temporary solutions. There’s even a washing bay. “Hopefully no more dirty busses during the winter,” Herkimer said, “because right now, to wash our bus, we have to go down to Salt Lake.” There are plans for a second phase that would include things like the additional barn and a public meeting space, but Rodriguez said that phase isn’t yet funded. This week, they’ll aim to begin the move and start transferring maintenance equipment. That means they can also start looking into breaking down the makeshift facilities at Ecker Hill, Herkimer said. “Our plan is the tent will go down first,” he said. “That’ll happen around the week of the 10th to the 15th of April.”Things are moving along, and the new headquarters will help keep the organization ahead of the curve: Rodriguez said the facility represents the organization’s first leap into leading the way on public transit in the Wasatch Back for the next 20-30 years. “We’re getting ready to start building our bus rapid transit on (S.R.) 224, and, of course, having an actual facility, and not a tent and trailer, goes a long way toward the operational efficiency of what will be only the second rural bus rapid transit in the nation,” Rodriguez said. The post High Valley Transit headquarters nearing May ribbon cutting appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less