Stopped, or just verrry verrrrry slow?

It is funny reading in today's Harvard Crimson that "none of the work [on the Harvard Science Complex] has deviated from the initial plan". While it may be true that Harvard "will make a decision about whether to proceed with the project in December", it is also clear that work on the Science Complex has almost completely stopped, and that certainly wasn't in the plan that Harvard has presented during the past several years.

Here are some views of the construction project from 1:45 this afternoon. During the planning for this project, Harvard said there would be several hundred construction workers. Remember all the time we spent talking about how Harvard would need to use the Sears site for construction worker parking because 400 parking spaces on the north side of Western Ave wouldn't be enough? Today I saw 3 workers there.






Two years ago, Harvard was demolishing the Pepsi building. The schedule that Harvard published in the DPIR (page 4-112) is:

Enabling and Demolition: 5 Months
Excavation and Foundations: 19 Months
Concrete Structure: 12 Months
Exterior Wall: 10 Months
Interior MEP and Finishes: 27 Months

This Harvard presentation on construction worker parking demand and trucks per hour shows that we should now be in the period of maximum construction parking demand (750 cars) with 1,000 workers on site. It is pretty obvious that the construction workforce has not ramped-up from 600 to 1,000 workers during this summer.



If this project were on schedule, Harvard would now be starting the Concrete Structure phase. The DPIR describes this phase as:

The buildings above grade will be constructed of reinforced concrete frames. The structure will be erected from four electrically operated tower or street cranes within the Project site. There will be approximately ten 65-foot trucks daily during this operation. The concrete operation will involve daily concrete placements with up to 35 concrete trucks on pour days.

When those 4 cranes arrive and we see a concrete truck arrive every 15 minutes we will know the project is back on track.