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19 April 2024
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Fire stations of the world: Purchase Fire Station boasts new additions and renovations, New York Fire District, US
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The Purchase Fire Station was renovated in 2021/2022 resulting in long-awaited improvements in firefighter health and safety, in-station training, space for housing apparatus, workspace for maintenance and firefighter bunking and personnel space. Purchase (NY) Fire Department was operating out of a fire house built in 1937 situated at 614 Anderson Hill Road, when the area was mostly rural, populated by farms and large estates. That station had a two-bay addition put on in 1968 with 10-foot-high door openings and in 1998 the station’s flat roof was removed and a second floor was added. But as fire apparatus got larger, space was at a premium in the two apparatus bays and the department knew it needed an addition to the station to solve the problems of space. The fire scene became more toxic and there is growing understanding of the role that the station plays in firefighter health, safety and training. The new addition is built with the future in mind.
“In the apparatus bays, we couldn’t get into one of our apparatus on the officer’s side because it was so close to the wall,” said Bob Makowski, Purchase fire district secretary and past chief. “And there was only two inches of clearance between the top of the aerial ladder’s light bar and the door opening. Also, at the time, we found it was necessary to have five firefighters bunking in the station and we had them sleeping in storage rooms and half of the day room.”
Purchase Fire Department covers 10 square miles with 50 volunteer firefighters from a single fire station, Makowski points out. “The area has grown significantly,” he says. “In our district we have PepsiCo’s world headquarters, MasterCard’s headquarters and Morgan Stanley’s headquarters, lots of office buildings and apartment complexes, State University of New York at Purchase, Manhattanville College, Purchase College, part of the Westchester County Airport, State Routes 270 and 684 and the Hutchison River Parkway.”
Bob Mitchell, principal at Mitchell Associates, says the addition his firm designed and built for Purchase is three levels with a basement storage area. The expansion has two double-deep, back-in apparatus bays on the ground level with a radio room between the addition and the existing building. The elevation of the property didn’t allow for drive-through bays.
Off the new apparatus bays are a self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) storage room, a decontamination room and decon laundry, a workshop, and a day room, Mitchell notes. Turnout gear is held along an apparatus bay wall in Ready Rack lockers. A second-floor mezzanine has storage and training props, including a bailout window, a manhole for extrication to the floor below and open space for the department’s forcible entry and other training props.
The station’s radio room extends into both the new and old apparatus bays to allow visual contact with each bay. A weather-proof and sound-proof generator room was also added behind the station that can handle the entire building in case of a power outage.
The third floor of the addition has five single-person dorm rooms with lockers, two four-person bunk rooms with lockers and three unisex bathrooms that each contain a shower, toilet and sink. The five dorm rooms are for the firefighters who live in the station. The other bunk rooms are set up to be occupied when there is an emergency in the area and they need to stand by in the station.
Storage was increased significantly, leaving the apparatus bay floor clear and providing spaces to be used for their dedicated purpose rather than overflow storage.
Site renovations provided additional parking spaces, replace an underground diesel fuel tank with an above-ground tank, upgrade the generator and provide an attenuation gallery for stormwater and an oil/water separator for the apparatus bay trench drains.
Source: Purchase Fire Department, Mitchell Associates Architects
“In the apparatus bays, we couldn’t get into one of our apparatus on the officer’s side because it was so close to the wall,” said Bob Makowski, Purchase fire district secretary and past chief. “And there was only two inches of clearance between the top of the aerial ladder’s light bar and the door opening. Also, at the time, we found it was necessary to have five firefighters bunking in the station and we had them sleeping in storage rooms and half of the day room.”
Purchase Fire Department covers 10 square miles with 50 volunteer firefighters from a single fire station, Makowski points out. “The area has grown significantly,” he says. “In our district we have PepsiCo’s world headquarters, MasterCard’s headquarters and Morgan Stanley’s headquarters, lots of office buildings and apartment complexes, State University of New York at Purchase, Manhattanville College, Purchase College, part of the Westchester County Airport, State Routes 270 and 684 and the Hutchison River Parkway.”
Bob Mitchell, principal at Mitchell Associates, says the addition his firm designed and built for Purchase is three levels with a basement storage area. The expansion has two double-deep, back-in apparatus bays on the ground level with a radio room between the addition and the existing building. The elevation of the property didn’t allow for drive-through bays.
Off the new apparatus bays are a self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) storage room, a decontamination room and decon laundry, a workshop, and a day room, Mitchell notes. Turnout gear is held along an apparatus bay wall in Ready Rack lockers. A second-floor mezzanine has storage and training props, including a bailout window, a manhole for extrication to the floor below and open space for the department’s forcible entry and other training props.
The station’s radio room extends into both the new and old apparatus bays to allow visual contact with each bay. A weather-proof and sound-proof generator room was also added behind the station that can handle the entire building in case of a power outage.
The third floor of the addition has five single-person dorm rooms with lockers, two four-person bunk rooms with lockers and three unisex bathrooms that each contain a shower, toilet and sink. The five dorm rooms are for the firefighters who live in the station. The other bunk rooms are set up to be occupied when there is an emergency in the area and they need to stand by in the station.
Storage was increased significantly, leaving the apparatus bay floor clear and providing spaces to be used for their dedicated purpose rather than overflow storage.
Site renovations provided additional parking spaces, replace an underground diesel fuel tank with an above-ground tank, upgrade the generator and provide an attenuation gallery for stormwater and an oil/water separator for the apparatus bay trench drains.
Source: Purchase Fire Department, Mitchell Associates Architects
