Structural steel erection is ongoing for the Whitefish City Hall construction project and concrete work continues on the attached parking structure.

The south wall and interior of City Hall is now framed and the building is beginning to take shape, according to Mike Cronquist, the city’s representative on the project.

“Structural steel began going up in the air a couple weeks ago and has continued the last two weekends,” he said. “We expect that to continue for the next three to four weeks. The schedule for the next few weeks will encompass the completion of structural steel erection and an increased effort in concrete work.”

Concrete work is focused largely at this point on the parking structure. More than 1,100 cubic yards have been placed — about 500 yards have been poured for City Hall foundations and the basement and the remaining is for the parking structure foundation.

“The concrete work for the parking structure will continue well into the end of the year,” Cronquist said. “In the next several weeks the columns along Baker Avenue will start to appear.”

The entire project is more than 25 percent completed and is on schedule with a targeted completion of early spring 2017. The two-story City Hall building is expected to house all of the city departments with the exception of police and fire which are located at the Emergency Services Building. The parking structure is set to house 212 parking spaces.

The section of alley adjacent to the project between Second Street and East First Street was closed in early spring to semi-truck traffic and was recently re-opened for deliveries.

Cronquist said the goal had been to open the alley by Memorial Day weekend but that was not attainable, but the alley should remain open now expect for temporary closures.

“Martel Construction made a huge effort to get that alley open to traffic,” he said.

East First Street between Central Avenue and Baker Avenue was re-opened last month to one-way westbound traffic to help alleviate summer traffic congestion. The south half of the parking lot at the northwest corner of East First Street and Central Avenue was closed to allow space for storage of materials and the construction trailer.

The city striped the north half of the parking lot and added temporary diagonal parking on the south side of East First Street between Central Avenue and the construction site.

Cronquist said he expects East First to remain open expect for temporary road closures as needed for construction work.