Anybody visiting the construction site of the new Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School, off The Quarter main road, cannot but marvel at the enormity of the project – including the sprawling area, the various works taking place and the mass number of men and equipment at work.
The site is the busiest and detailed construction project ever seen in Anguilla at any one time. At an estimated building cost of some $25 million US dollars, it is by far the largest and most costly of all the public sector projects currently being funded under the UK Government’s humanitarian grant of 60 million pounds to Anguilla. The money was provided as a gift to Anguilla following Hurricane Irma, in September 2017, which severally damaged or otherwise compromised various school buildings, health facilities, the Blowing point Port Passenger Terminal and other Government buildings.
So far, three contracts have been issued to build separate portions of the Comprehensive School. Two of them involve Orchard, Romney and Beck and Synergy Construction; and the third, involves a partnership of Cuthwin Webster, Sony Ruan and Glenville Hodge. A fourth contract or package is yet to be announced.
Friday, May 29, saw an almost day-long concrete pouring of the section of the project for which the above partnership has responsibility.
Speaking on behalf of the Joint Venture Group, as his partnership team is called, Mr. Webster told The Anguillian newspaper. “We are responsible for package two, the grounds of the project. This comprises the sewage system, and other underground services including drainage; the landscaping; parking lots and Building ‘H’. Then we have to build soak-away systems, manholes etc. We have to ensure a proper connection between the underground and the top ground. For instance, we have to ensure that when a toilet is flushed, on the third floor, the content finds its way down to the septic system – and that system we be a plant in itself. That plant will generate the water to keep the landscaped grounds green.”
According to Mr. Webster, 155 cubic yards of cement were poured, on the above date, on the bottom of the cistern and other parts of the project assigned to his Joint Venture Company.