Crews preparing site for construction of $6.2M fire station in Lindenwald
City expects new building to be ready by early next year.
HAMILTON — Site work for the new Lindenwald fire station is underway, and signs of construction should begin soon.
Plans to relocate Station 26 began in earnest in 2022, when Hamilton started its planning and design phase in the process to replace the antiquated Laurel Avenue station with a state-ofthe-art facility.
Last February, the city secured a 21/2-acre piece of land for the new station on Ohio 4, though they had to combine two parcels through the Community Improvement Corporation. Hamilton Fire Chief Thomas Eickelberger said, when asked why this process took so long to get started, there were “many layers to that onion.”
The city received just one response when officials first advertised a request for pro- posals. When they did not come to an agreement, Ham- ilton put the bid back out and received multiple options.
Hamilton went with CUC as the general contractor to construct the $6.2 million fire station.
Now until later in April, the contractor will be get- ting the site ready for foun- dation work, Eickelberger said. The plan, he said, is to begin foundation work and construction by the end of April and have work on the new station complete by the end of this year or the begin- ning of 2025.
“They’ve got a pretty good plan put together,” the chief said. “They have high hopes and expectations of being able to get this completed very swiftly.”
Eventually, Eickelberger said, the city would like to build a training facility behind the station.
The current Station 26 is at 651 Laurel Ave., and the cost of maintaining the build- ing constructed in 1910 is not worth it anymore.
The Lindenwald fire sta- tion was built during a time when fire vehicles were not as big or as heavy. Eickel- berger said within the past several years, they com- pleted a project in the sta- tion’s basement to shore up the structure under the bays because there were signs of structural failure.
The new Station 26 will provide the department wi h a larger space for any future operational growth deemed necessary. But when it opens, there will be more bay space for apparatus and medic units and better amenities, including a training confer- ence room, a bigger gym area and individual sleep- ing quarters.
Eickelberger said before the plans were put together, a small cross-section of the Hamilton Fire Department traveled to fire stations in the region and talked with administrators and firefight- ers. They discussed what had worked and what hadn’t worked.
“The plans for this build- ing were based on those vis- its and conversations,” the chief said.
Lindenwald is the city’s most populous neighbor- hood. The new firehouse will be on the eastern edge of the neighborhood, across the railroad tracks from the historic section of the com- munity. When the new loca- tion was first presented to the community, the major concern was it being east of the railroad tracks.
But Eickelberger told the Journal-News this week, reas- suring those initial concerns, that “the city of Hamilton and the Hamilton Fire Department will continue to provide top-notch services to the neighborhood of Lindenwald, as we always have.”
What will happen with Station 26’s current site is unknown.
A decade ago, the city decommissioned Station 27 on Schuler Avenue and sold it through an RFP process to a private organization. The chief said the fire department has no plans for the historic building once the department moves out.