Gov’t taking steps to curb dust, noise at tarmac schools as hospital works begin

The government says it is taking steps to mitigate against dust and noise at the two temporary schools at the Arnos Vale tarmac as construction of the acute referral hospital begins there soon.

Minister of Education Curtis King told Parliament on Thursday that the loudest noises at the construction site will be approximately 110 decibels at intermittent intervals.

A power saw, jackhammer, or motorcycle produces a sound that is around 110 decibels.

But King said the calculated noise level transmitted to the Thomas Saunders Secondary School (TSSS), the closer of the two schools to the site, would not exceed approximately 65 decibels.

This decibel level is like the noise of normal conversation or an electric toothbrush.

“… this falls within the current noise level range,” King told Parliament.

He, however, said that “Notwithstanding this moderate level of noise, the contractor will be required to ensure that all equipment has proper functioning mufflers and particularly noisy operations are to be scheduled with the schools in mind.”

He was responding to a question from West Kingstown MP, Daniel Cummings who noted the impending beginning of construction of the hospital.

Cummings asked King to tell Parliament when the students who are housed temporarily at the site of the decommissioned airport would be allowed to return to their schools in Kingstown.

The opposition lawmaker also wanted to know what arrangements would be in place to reduce the dust and noise from construction and their negative impacts on the students and teachers.

The Girls High School and TSSS have been located at the temporary campuses since November 2021 and September 2022, respectively.

King told Parliament that due to the “unforeseen poor condition” of the original campuses at the two schools, which were not accounted for in the original contract, it became necessary to initiate a new tender process for their design, demolition and replacement.

He said the original contract for TSSS has been completed.

“Unfortunately, there are certain structural — I would say challenges — that were not identified at the initial stage,” the education minister told Parliament.

He said some buildings at GHS are complete but when work began on the Grimble building, it was realised that it had certain structural challenges that were not identified at the initial stage.

“And hence, a decision had to be taken with regard to these two campuses. And basically, we have to redesign them,” King said, noting that that process takes time.

“And what is happening, that process is still going on, hence the reason why these schools are still at Arnos Vale,” he said, adding that once the new designs are completed, the projects will go out to tender, with construction expected to commence by the end of this year or early next year.

“The anticipated completion timeline is approximately 15 months thereafter,” King said.

He said that the Arnos Vale hospital site was subjected to an environmental and social impact assessment study in June 2018, which was upgraded in August 2023.

King said TSSS is the closer of the two schools to the construction site, a distance of about 260 meters (853.018 feet). The site is 500 metres (1,640 feet) from GHS.

He said the baseline noise level was recorded adjacent to TSSS from Sept. 5 to 9, varying between 57.88 and 110.4 decibels.

“These noise levels were due mainly to vehicular activity on the crossroad road.

These were generated basically by vehicles that were using the road across the decommissioned airport,” King said.

 He said dust is not expected to be an issue during construction operations as the subsurface conditions have been determined to be moist to wet.

“Also reducing the potential for dust generation is the fact that the site is grass and a significant portion paved with asphalt.

The education minister, however, said that despite these “helpful mitigating factors”, the contractor is mandated to provide water trucks to reduce or eliminate the migration of dust generated from on-site activity and to provide all trucks transporting material to and from the site with tarpaulin.

“The schools are very important. So too is the hospital, and I have no doubt that working together, we will be able to navigate whatever challenges that might emerge during this construction phase,” he told the sitting of Parliament in which lawmakers authorised the government to borrow US$125 million from Taiwan to build the hospital.

However, Cummings noted that King did not address the issue of dust from cement works.

King said:

“With regards to whether or not consideration would have been given to the cement used, obviously, that would have been considered. But I can’t give you the details, as I don’t have in front of me, the plan or the report from the study.”