The existing Burlington High School building has critical deficiencies that would be extremely costly, time-consuming and disruptive to fix one at a time. At any time, the failure of a major system – like Heating Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC) – could force a closure of the school, leading to unpredictable costs, expensive emergency repairs, and disruptions to learning. Here are some specific problems:
- Repairs and renovations to the existing school to simply bring it up to current code compliance along with a new HVAC system will cost nearly $330 million.
- Multiple building systems are currently operating beyond their warranty and their projected end of usable life; for example, the HVAC computer system runs off of floppy disks from the 1980s.
- Science labs from the 1970s are obsolete; for example, the Bunsen burners don’t work
- The building lacks a modern fire suppression system, a glaring safety issue.
- There is very limited accessibility for disabled students and faculty, with disjointed floors, limited elevator service, and a main hallway that is too steep for safe crutch and wheelchair use.
- More than half of the classrooms have no natural light, i.e. no windows, which is not conducive to learning.