Larry Kline
Havre Daily News
lkline@havredailynews.com
Two large mounts of earth have taken shape on land west of the Wal-Mart site as work has begun on the construction of a planned supercenter.
Patrick Construction & Pipeline foreman Dave Armstrong on Monday said trucks began delivering material to the site on March 18 and have been working 24 hours a day.
The world's largest retail chain plans to build a 105,000-square-foot supercenter on the 12-acre site west of Kmart along U.S. Highway 2. The store will sell groceries, garden supplies, tires and provide oil and lube service.
Company officials have said the store will employ about 275 people, with about 60 percent working full time.
Wal-Mart spokesmen have said the construction process takes about 10 months, meaning the store will likely open in early 2007.
An official with Henry Carlson Co., a Sioux Falls, S.D., contractor, today said the company has been selected as the general contractor for the project. He could not comment on which local companies have been selected as subcontractors.
Trucks have been dumping two types of “structural fill material,” Armstrong said. One is a sand-based mix and the other a clay-and-gravel mix. The two will be blended with water before they are added to the store's site, he said.
Armstrong said workers will strip topsoil from the site and then add the fill material, eventually raising the grade by nine feet. The project specifications call for the fill to be allowed to settle for 70 days before work begins in earnest on the building's construction.
Armstrong said workers may be able to begin work sooner than 70 days, depending on how well the earth settles.
He said the preliminary site work is supposed to be completed by mid-May.
“We have a tight timeline on this whole project,” Armstrong said.
Patrick will also perform excavation work at the site when it comes time to dig trenches for the store's footings, he said.
