Plans revealed for new Bassick High
BRIDGEP ORT — The city’s new Bassick High School will be four stories tall, have a front door that f aces Broad Street and will turn the base of Laf ayette Street into a cul de sac.
Those were the preliminary design plans shared this week at virtual meetings of the city’s
School Building Committee and school board.
Architect Joe Costa of Perkins Eastman, a Stamford design firm, called the new site on the University of Bridgeport campus exciting and at the same time challenging.
“The goal is to design a fantastic new high school for the community,” Costa said.
The 10-acre site, located about a mile and a quarter from the current Bassick, is a bit smaller than the present location and will require a 14-foothigh coastal flood defense wall and resiliency berm to cut the property down the middle.
The $115 million project was delayed more than a year after the proposed location of the site was changed twice. The plan to move the school to the foot of the UB campus was kept a secret from the public until it was announced by Mayor Joseph Ganim in July.
Design work already underway for a new school on Bassick’s Fairfield Avenue site had to be largely scrapped. New designs will add $600,000 to architectural costs, which now total $5.1 million.
City Finance Director Ken Flatto questioned the need to start the design from scratch.
While many of the interior programmatic plans can be used in the new design, Costa said the exterior of a new Bassick on University Avenue will need to be reconfigured to conform to the geometry of the site.
On the new site, four buildings — include North and South halls and Bodine Hall — need to be torn down.
Of two designs — one three stories and the other four — presented to the committee, the group opted for four stories, which will allow the design to take advantage of the area’s waterfront views.
The new Bassick will measure about 200,000 square feet and have parking for about 180 cars adjacent to Knights Field, a pristine soccer field that was part of the city’s acquisition.
It will be the first time in Bassick’s history that it will have a home athletic field of any kind.
Because of the flood berm, designing the footprint of the new school to the north side of the purchased property was described as a significant challenge by the architects.
The school’s auto shop, which has demanding ventilation requirements will be a free-standing building. The first floor of the main building will have an administrative suite, gymnasium, auditorium, cafeteria and other common spaces.
The upper three floors will house classrooms and the media center, all providing views of Long Island Sound and Seaside Park.
City Council member Marcus Brown, co-chairman of the building committee, asked if the new school would have a unisex bathroom. He was told yes.
Later, during a presentation to the school board, board member Albert Benejan, a former P TSO president at Bassick, asked if
there would be space for parents. He was told yes.
Costa told the building committee they would be back in few months with more detailed schematic drawings.
School board chairman John Weldon, who also is a member of the building committee, asked when there would be an opportunity for the public, particularly South End residents, to give input.
Two community forums were held when the school was to be at the Bassick site. None have been held about the new site, which is in a different neighborhood.
Schools Superintendent Michael Testani questioned the need at this stage of the project.
Current Bassick families, Testani said, will be gone before the new school is built. He said he was uncertain that parents of younger children would have the expertise to weigh in on school design.
“As long there is the input of the principal and his team, Bridgeport Board of Education folks and the superintendents office ... I think we will be
in good shape,” Testani said.
City Council member Ernest Newton, a member of the building committee, said the community where
the school is being put should be allowed to weigh in. He cautioned that changes made to the design of Harding High School late in the process ended up costing the city more money.
A new Harding was completed in 2018 on the site of the former General Electric property off Boston Avenue after an extensive cleanup of toxins in the ground.
Th e o r i g i n a l Ha r d i n g de s i g n st a r t e d o f f b e i n g b a s e d o n a n e n r o l l me nt s e ve r a l h u n d r e d s t u d e nt s l owe r t h a n t h e p o p u l at i o n o f t h e s c h o o l . No t u nt i l t h e p ub l i c a n d s o me b o a r d me mb e r s o b j e c t e d d i d t h e s c h o o l ’s f o o t p r i nt e x p a n d . By t h e n , it wa s t o o l at e t o e n l a r ge t h e g y mn a s i u m, wh i c h i s c o n s i d e r e d b y ma ny t o b e t o o s ma l l .
Weldon agreed now is the time for public input.
“Not when 30, 60, 90 percent of the design is complete,” Weldon said. “That is where we get into trouble and cost overruns start to occur.”
A date for a public session has not yet been set.