LOWELL — After several years of meetings delivering bad news about “unforeseen conditions,” cost overruns and construction issues with the Lowell High rebuild and renovation project, Suffolk Construction presented an unremarkable update to the School Building Committee during its Sept. 18 meeting at City Hall.
“Nothing’s changed from the last presentation,” Suffolk Construction Vice President and Project Executive Justin Lyon told the body, referring to the previous meeting of Aug. 14. “Floors three through the basement in the 1922 building are on track to be turned over for the start of school in January 2026 after the Christmas break.”
The four-phased construction project was approved in 2016 and broke ground in 2020. Phases 1 and 2 consisted of new construction and are completed, including the opening of the new Riddick Athletic Center, the five-story Freshman Academy, and the three-story addition that connects the academy, the gym and the new school entrance off the Father Morissette Boulevard entrance.
Phases 3 and 4 are more complicated renovation projects of the 1980s, 1922 and 1892 buildings that have drained the $21.2 million construction contingency fund and delayed the completion of the project by one year, layering on additional costs.
“Going back to the start of the project, there were a lot of unforeseen conditions as it related to the mechanical coordination and the structure,” Lyons said. “There were unforeseen conditions everywhere.”
Those unforeseen conditions will cost the city at least an additional $40 million. The higher price tag on the project is now almost $422 million from its initial approved amount of almost $382 million.
Some of those conditions included retooling basic plumbing plans.
In a 2023 meeting, the School Building Committee learned that the architecture firm Perkins Eastman designed the bathrooms for the newly constructed Riddick Athletic Center based on a plumbing code scaled to a schoolwide basis versus the operational area served.
The 3,000-seat gym was built with two toilets for each gender by the first-floor entryway off Arcand Drive, and five toilets for each gender off the gym’s second-floor court. Schematics show the current seven toilet fixture plans were part of the design as early as 2018.
Suffolk took down ceilings and opened up walls during a pre-construction evaluation for the risk of asbestos contamination in 2019, but asbestos-containing materials were found in “unique” places in the Cyrus W. Irish Auditorium during the 2024 demolition.
As a result, more than $400,000 in increased costs were deducted from the city’s construction contingency, and the opening of the renovated auditorium was delayed from June 2025 to early 2026.
A construction contingency is money set aside to pay for change orders from new requests or unforeseen construction requirements. The original $21.2 million was built into the $381 million project, but has been “replenished” for a total of almost $35 million.
“The auditorium – the plan is to be finishing the specialized AV acoustics, through the course of January, February for a March turnover,” Lyons said.
This February, Suffolk Construction reported settling of the soil underneath the slab in the basement of the 1922 building. Remediating the slab cost $1.75 million. Additional issues in the 1922 building include the variety of wall types discovered behind the 1-inch plaster walls during demolition, which led to more “unforeseen conditions.”
Some issues not related to unforeseen conditions, but related to work product and subcontractor construction practices, were raised by member John Leahy, who serves as the deputy facilities director in the Facilities Department of the Lowell Public Schools.
“The sections that aren’t painted, finished, the floors have glue on them, the seams don’t look the best,” he said, referring to floor tile that was buckling and bubbling, which Lyons attributed to the glue used.
“We have to redo certain things,” he said. “We do have to take care of that.”
He said crews would be working Saturdays starting last weekend, to remedy those issues.
Kendrick Del Obre was the LHS student representative to the body who has continued his service on the committee while a student in urban planning at Westfield State University. He asked Skanska Project Manager Jim Dowd whether the new gas stoves that were incorrectly installed in the culinary arts classrooms and the wrong stair treads in the gym would be fixed.
“It was an error by the subcontractor…” Dowd said. “If there are any costs incurred because of the subcontractor errors, they [Suffolk] are sure to backcharge the subcontractors. We are very diligent in holding them accountable. There is no cost to the city.”
Del Orbe said that he remains committed to the Lowell High School project.
“I have been monitoring, collaborating with peers and staff, and following the physical development of LHS for nearly 2 years now,” he said by text from WSU on Tuesday. “It’s important to me and my fellow committee members this project gets built as intended, and as promised to Lowell students, as well as our taxpayers.”
A major completed piece of the Phase 1 and 2 development was the placement of the ornamental fence at Arcand Drive that closes off the interior quad space created by the Riddick gym and the Freshman Academy.
The steel panels depict Lowell’s canal system, while providing a secure space for students to congregate outside.
