EATON, N.Y. — Madison County has a new $16 million highway garage on Brown Road in Eaton.

This facility replaces the current one in Morrisville on Cedar Street that has served the southern half of the county since 1948, Madison County said in a news release.

Firms working on the project included Rochester–based LeChase Construction Services, LLC, which has an office in Syracuse; C&S Companies of Salina; Beebe Construction Services of Utica; S.C. Spencer Electric of Constableville; Brosh Mechanical, Inc. of Clay; Comfort Systems USA (NYSE: FIX); LaValley Bros. Construction of Wolcott; and Johnson Controls (NYSE: JCI). 

To help reduce project costs, the Madison County Highway Department handled a lot of the site work, paving, and grounds landscaping in-house. 

The project includes a 51,000-square-foot highway facility, a 22,500-square-foot salt-storage building, a 12,300-square-foot cold-storage building, a fire pump house, and a fuel facility. 

The main parking area can hold up to 12 fully loaded plow trucks, in addition to several pickup trucks and miscellaneous pieces of equipment. It also includes an almost-10,000-square-foot maintenance area that has heavy truck lifts and standard vehicle lifts to make servicing and maintaining vehicles easier and more efficient. 

The new garage has substantial storage area to keep all the highway equipment under cover and out of the elements when they are not in use, Madison County said. The fueling station has above-ground tanks that “minimize the possibility” of leaking and contaminating the groundwater. 

It also includes work and training spaces for employees, along with a place for the Madison County Sheriff’s Department to keep vehicles. 

“Because Madison County pushed forward with this important project in March 2020, just a few short weeks into the COVID-19 pandemic, the county has saved hundreds of thousands of dollars for its taxpayers and kept important trades workers employed during this difficult time,” Madison County Administrator Mark Scimone said in a statement. “If we had waited and pumped the brakes on this project for several months, we would have fallen victim to the material cost increases that have rocked the construction industry over the last year. Lumber costs have skyrocketed over 500%, steel prices have gone up over 75%, and copper prices have increased over 125%, since our bid date. Delivering a successful project, well under budget, is something of which the entire County and the Construction team can be proud. And to the best of our knowledge there were zero reported positive cases of COVID-19 on the highway-facility project, start to finish.”

The Madison County Highway Department maintains 434.4 miles of road, 124 bridges, and 143 large sized culverts (spans between 5 and 20 feet).

“We are excited to be opening the doors to our new highway facility,” Madison County Board Chairman John Becker said. “For years now, we have known that a new facility was needed to serve the southern part of our county. The old garage was not adequate or safe for our equipment or for our employees. This new state of the art facility will serve our community for years to come.”

Morrisville garage 

As for the Morrisville garage, Madison County is currently working on putting together a request for proposal for “responsible removal” of the buildings and environmental cleanup of the site, Samantha Field, public information officer for Madison County, tells CNYBJ in an email.

“That will take a few months to complete. Currently there are no official plans on future use of the site after that, but we are looking into several ideas,” Field says.

The facility in Morrisville had “many issues,” according to the county. Plow trucks could not be maneuvered efficiently because steel-structural columns were spaced so that trucks had to be stacked three deep in a bay. If one truck was needed, sometimes one or two others had to be moved to use that vehicle. 

In addition, trucks in the 1950s were smaller than they are today, so newer vehicles don’t fit properly in the space. The mechanic’s maintenance area had no lifts and limited working space. 

The building had constant heating issues, no air conditioning, a leaking roof, and plumbing problems, which were not “adequate conditions” for employees, Madison County said. Complaints from residents in the village about noise was another issue, along with the potential for salt contamination to the ground-water supply. 

Project partners took all those issues into consideration during the design and development process for the new highway garage, according to Madison County.     ν

ALBANY, N.Y. — The real-estate market in New York state stayed hot in June as realtors sold 13,111 previously-owned homes in the month, up 55.4 percent from the 8,436 homes they sold in June 2020. House prices also continued to jump as inventory remained tight. 

Pending sales in the state rose about 11 percent in June, which indicates that increases in closed sales may moderate in the coming months.

The numbers come from the New York State Association of Realtors (NYSAR)’s June housing-market report issued July 22.

“Median sales prices continued to rise in the Empire State in June while the number of homes available remained at record lows,” NYSAR said to open its report. 

Sales data

Pending sales totaled 16,481 in June, up 11.3 percent from 14,814 in the same month in 2020, according to the NYSAR data.

The statewide median sales price soared more than 28 percent to $385,000 in June, from the June 2020 median sales price of $300,000.

The months’ supply of homes for sale at the end of this June stood at 3 months, down 43 percent from 5.3 months a year ago, per NYSAR. A 6 month to 6.5 month supply is considered to be a balanced market. 

The inventory of homes for sale totaled 42,598 in June, off 21 percent from 53,939 in June 2020.

Central New York data

Realtors in Onondaga County sold 451 previously owned homes in June, up about 35 percent from the 333 homes sold in the same month in 2020. The median sales price rose about 21 percent to nearly $200,000 from $165,000 a year ago, according to the NYSAR report.

The association also reports that realtors sold 167 homes in Oneida County in June, up nearly 37 percent from the 122 they sold during June 2020. The median sales price increased about 20 percent to more than $170,000 from over $142,000 a year ago.

Realtors in Broome County sold 167 existing homes in June, up almost 88 percent from 89 a year ago, according to the NYSAR report. The median sales price rose about 36 percent to more than $147,000 from in excess of $108,000 a year ago. 

In Jefferson County, realtors closed on 165 homes in June, up about 68 percent from 98 a year prior, and the median sales price of $180,000 was up about 8 percent from more than $166,000 a year ago, according to the NYSAR data.

All home-sales data is compiled from multiple-listing services in New York state and it includes townhomes and condominiums in addition to existing single-family homes, according to NYSAR.