Warren Central plan calls for new entrance and expansion
Published 6:58 pm Sunday, May 20, 2018
Front of Warren Central
Back of Warren Central
Front of Warren Central
A career academy expansion and a new entrance location will be the biggest changes to Warren Central High School under a proposed design unveiled Thursday.
Gary Bailey, who is managing the Vicksburg Warren School District’s facilities plan for Dale Bailey Architecture, unveiled the preliminary design for Warren Central at a work session for the Board of Trustees Thursday evening.
Viking Alley, the open area between the A and B buildings, will be enclosed creating a central forum that runs the length of the school and the new primary entrance to the building. With a 40-foot high ceiling and the space above the existing buildings enclosed almost entirely in glass, the space will become the focal point of the school both visually and functionally.
“It is like looking at Disney World,” Warren Central principal Eric Green said. “From this being a vision of ours three years ago to actually seeing facilities that are being built specifically for the purposes we only dreamed about, I don’t even have words to describe that.”
Entering the space, which is being called the agora presently, the school store, student run credit union and existing band hall will be on the students’ right. To the left will be a new main office and jutted out glass entranceway to the gymnasium, which will potentially be seeing a major overhaul.
If the budget holds, the plans call for turning the basketball court 180 degrees from its current position so the baskets will be pointing at the auditorium and the agora.
Retractable visitor side bleachers and new visitor locker rooms will be built on one side, and permanent bleachers will be built where the cafeteria and kitchen currently are, “assuming we can make the budget all work,” Bailey said. “The equity is extremely important. If we are able to do it at one school, we are doing it at the other. It is on the bubble right now and something that was not in the original program, but if we can afford it we are going to do it, but we are not there yet.”
Under the permanent bleachers, home lockers, bathrooms and a concession area will be built, which was a design idea presented by current Warren Central students.
“To see some of their input in the layout of our gym and the new concession and bathroom area, that came from our students,” Green said. “To see them put that on paper and some of our students to say, ‘Hey, I got to come over here and that is what we said,’ and that to be put in the actual floor plans is awesome.”
At the far end of the existing Viking Alley, a new cafeteria with seating opening into the agora will be built as will a new media center.
A sizable expansion will be added to the front of the building where the entrance is currently to house the HHS and ACME academies with labs including a mock courtroom, engineering labs and a culinary arts space.
The CAB academy will go where the majority of the current classrooms are along the hallways behind the auditorium.
Under the current plan, the band and chorus building will stay mostly the same except for minor changes necessitated by the closing in of Viking Alley. Building B will undergo some changes including a new main staircase with a mix of stairs and seating space being built that will lead from the agora to the second level.
Outside of the main building, there will be some changes to parking and entryways, but unlike Vicksburg High where a new roadway is planned, the two existing entrances to Warren Central will be the same.
The difference will be that both will be expanded to three lanes with the plan to have a loop with one lane of bus entrance on one side and one lane of bus exit on the other. Cars will travel in an opposite loop with two lanes to enter and exit.
“Won’t that be nice. You can actually get out,” board member Sally Bullard said.
The football stadium will see expanded bleachers and the track will be reconfigured to allow for eight regulation lanes.
“You’ve got room between these (the visitor) bleachers and we will rebuilding the loop and these lanes to get eight lanes,” Bailey said.
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