Greenwich FD To Build King St. Fire Station

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Town to buy King St. land for fire station

   

By Neil Vigdor

Staff Writer, Greenwich Time

June 25, 2004

In an effort to cut down on emergency response times in northwest Greenwich, the town agreed yesterday to buy a residential property along the burgeoning King Street corridor for $1.275 million for public safety facilities.

The 2.5-acre property adjacent to the Griffith E. Harris Memorial Golf Course will eventually become home to a new fire station.

Greenwich Emergency Med-ical Service Inc. will also station one of its four ambulances on the site at 1327 King St.

First Selectman Jim Lash announced the deal after a closed-door executive session at Town Hall, saying the property's owner was retiring and looking to sell.

"It was a very high priority once we realized the land was going to be available,'' said Lash, who identified the property's owner as Richard Bellanger.

The deal still requires the approval of the Planning and Zoning Commission, the Board of Estimate and Taxation and the Representative Town Meeting before a date is set for closing, which Lash expects to be set for December.

Public safety officials hailed yesterday's announcement as a major development in their ongoing efforts to expedite response times in the northwestern part of town.

"This is going to be an enormous assistance in that respect," GEMS Executive Director Charlee Tufts said.

The ambulance corps added a fourth vehicle to its fleet in November 2002 to reduce response times in northwest Greenwich, which Tufts said had previously been estimated at nine to 10 minutes.

Without a base of operations along the King Street corridor, Tufts said GEMS has been unable to meet its ultimate goal of a 4 to 5-minute average response time, however.

Fire Chief Daniel Warzoha reported similar problems, saying the average response time in the northwestern part of town exceeded eight minutes for his department -- about double the amount of time for a call in central Greenwich.

"This has been something that we brought to the forefront several years ago as things started to develop on King Street and we saw response times deteriorate and calls for service escalate," Warzoha said, adding that the disparity in response times could mean the difference between whether a home is saved or not.

The King Street corridor is home to several new housing developments, two nursing homes, the Westchester County Airport and a growing number of schools and corporations.

Town officials said they will eventually demolish the house on the property to make room for the new fire station, which would cost in excess of $700,000 to construct.

The town's last attempt to reduce response times culminated with the opening of 4,600-square-foot fire station on North Street in February 2001. The facility cost $1.2 million to construct and is staffed by four full-time firefighters.

"This is the first step in a process that is going to take several years to complete," Warzoha said.

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Isn't Rye Brook covering King Street as well? I've heard this firehouse will be right down the street from them.