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The Mecosta-Osceola Intermediate School District is moving ahead with their proposed bus expansion project with the help of JBS Construction this summer. 

The Mecosta-Osceola Intermediate School District is moving ahead with their proposed bus expansion project with the help of JBS Construction this summer. 

MECOSTA – The Mecosta-Osceola Intermediate School District is seeking to make improvements to its transportation department through a bus garage expansion plan that was approved to begin construction over the summer months. 

The district partnered with the Mecosta-Osceola Transit Authority for the project and split the cost. The project bid the district accepted was for $427,000 with JBS Contracting.

Mark Klumpp, assistant superintendent with the district, said the project will be a welcome improvement to the department. 

“Historically, the MOISD has not had a transportation facility,” Klumpp said. “For years, we just worked out of a small pole barn behind the career center that you could fit one bus in. As time went on, and we grew, we've now got a fleet of 10 buses and 15 vans."

“The MOTA had a change in leadership and that relationship kind of fell apart and sort of forced us to come back to the property that we had just purchased the previous year across the road from the Career Center,” he added. “There was a house and then what's called a Quonset hut where a local family had run an excavating business many years ago. We tore the house down, and we renovated the Quonset hut to fit our needs.”

The office and driver’s lounge were located in a house on an adjacent property that the district had also purchased in the previous year. They also fielded bids for an addition to go to the front of the Quonset hut. The addition gives the district two additional work bays. A small fleet also gives them a lounge area for the drivers and two offices for our transportation director and mechanic. 

Klumpp said the addition of a wash bay will be a beneficial one. 

“We added an alternate for a wash bay and that is 18 by 48, so about 864 square feet,” Klumpp said. “The reason for the wash bay is currently we wash our buses, it’s not like we can pull them through the car wash at Currie’s or somewhere like that. We wash them out in the parking lot behind the Career Center.

“We drive thousands of miles of dirt roads in the multiple counties that we operate in,” he added. “With busses costing around $100,000 a piece now, we want to be able to extend their life as long as possible. Getting that road salt and dirt and grime off helps extend the life and helps with the maintenance and operation of those vehicles.”

During a Big Rapids City Commission meeting held May 18, members discussed the expansion and what the plans entailed.  Community development director Paula Priebe noted that the plan looked good to go. 

“They did a pre-application meeting with staff and reviewed the plans and found them to be in line with all city regulations," Priebe said. 

Lorenz Surveying and Engineering Inc. worked on the civil engineering plans for the project. Pete Lorenz, an engineer with the company, explained more about the specifics of the project. 

“Currently the property is on private well and septic and there are available water lines on Bronson,” Lorenz said. “The plan is to abandon the current well and connect to city water. There is a septic and a drain field on the property as well as a sanitary sewer available on the WPT at the back."

“Financially, it will be a big commitment by the owners to do that but they plan to run the sanitary sewer line from the manhole at WPT up to the building,” he added. “It’s critical for the proposed wash bin to have a grit separator outside the building to make sure they are not putting anything in the sewer system that shouldn’t be."

Hunter Nivision, a contractor with JBS, said the additions should be relatively simple. 

“As far as the building, we are doing steel plate construction adding 2,500 square feet of the service area and an 800 square feet bus wash area,” Nivision said. “Those will be separated by a three-hour fire wall, and there will be two offices and a break area inside the service area.” 

According to Lorenz, in the area along the back side of the property, the infiltration system has very good sand and it percolates very well. The construction company will be putting a storm water basin on the back side of the parking lot to collect the drainage and infiltrate it into the ground much the way it is doing now. The next step for the project will be getting excavators started on the site.

Klumpp said the project will reuse some soil that was used in another project.

The building construction is scheduled to start towards the end of June and is scheduled to be completed before the school year starts at the end of August.

Klumpp said the project continues the district’s goals of maintaining its transportation as best it can for staff and students. 

“We always look for ways to make things as efficient as possible,” Klumpp said. “Whether that's using fleet maintenance management software that we recently purchased, some portable lifts system that we can lift an entire bus off the ground 8 to 10 feet. With these, we can do a better job servicing and inspecting it.

"The buses carry the most precious thing in the world, and that’s the children that we're educating, so we want to make sure they're safe and fleet management is kept properly."

For more information on the MOISD and its transportation department, visit the district’s website at www.moisd.org.