Bigger Virden fire hall will be better for firefighters

VIRDEN — The fire chief of Wallace District Fire Department Station No. 1 is excited about an upcoming project that aims to double the size of the fire hall in Virden.

Ground is expected to be broken next year on a 5,200-square-foot building, Chief Cory Nixon said. The building will be erected beside the current 4,800-square-fire station building, which will be remodelled so the two buildings form a new, modern station.

“It’s a massive step forward for us,” Nixon said.

The expansion will solve two primary issues: lack of space, and health and safety concerns, he said.

The hall at 330 11th Ave. South will be divided into “dirty” and “clean” sections. The allocated dirty areas will contain clothes and equipment that come back from fire calls, and the clean side will be reserved for the firefighters and their equipment that have been decontaminated, Nixon said.

The redesign will address a growing concern in firefighting today, that firefighters suffer a higher than normal cancer rate. The rates are tied to their routine exposure to carcinogens at the scene of fires.

The hall is being designed to prevent chemicals from coming back into the common areas of the fire hall, and being tracked back home with the firefighters. Quality-of-life features will be added, like more than 30 personal lockers to store clothing, and six showers to wash off. The hall will also have better ventilation than the existing 1977-built hall, and laundry machines to clean personal clothes. The fire hall currently does not have a functioning shower, and altogether the dated hall weighs on firefighters, Nixon said.

“They don’t want to come down and use the space now because it’s gross,” Nixon said. “It’s honestly relieving now that they have the opportunity to stay clean and cancer-free.”

Firefighting equipment will be kept in the new building. Volunteers will have a separate building for common space, training and meeting, which will not share open space with firefighting equipment.

The team has been excited to hear about the change, Nixon said.

“We already have guys talking about putting gym equipment in.”

Virden Mayor Tina Williams told the Sun that the town has put away money for roughly 15 years to support the expansion. Council has worked with a committee of local firefighters to inform the new design — and health and safety was a major factor influencing the design.

“If we want people to keep volunteering, we need them to see there’s a clean space for them,” Williams said. “We have a good volunteer fire department and we want to keep them safe and healthy.”

The Province of Manitoba allocated $1.5 million to support the project in January, and the Town of Virden will match the funding for a total project cost of $3 million. The project is exciting to support, Glen Simard, Minister of Municipal and Northern Relations, told the Sun.

“Virden has a proven track record of working collaboratively with their neighbours,” Simard said. “And the regional impact that it has with the Wallace District Fire, I think all of that put together bodes really well for them, and it’s a big addition. So we’re really happy to expand their capacity there.”

Simard added the fire station is a valuable resource given as the community and industry in the area are growing.

The Virden station was one of 22 approved project investments the province announced in January.

While the new station is being built, Nixon said, the plan is for the fire team to work out of its current hall, then relocate into the new building once it’s finished. Then the old hall will be gutted and rebuilt with a new layout. When both buildings are finished, trucks and equipment will be kept in the new, larger one and firefighters will be based out of the other building.

The expansion is going to address the growing issue of tight quarters, which has become a safety issue, Nixon said. He said the station currently gets crowded with vehicles that are too big for the nearly 50-year-old building.

Roughly a dozen firefighting suits have been snagged and ripped during the chief’s time at the hall, as firefighters rush through narrow corridors between trucks to load-up for calls.

Nixon added that several vehicles are squeezed into the same bay, and need to be parked so close that their doors open into each other. This is one of the added difficulties that will be removed for firefighters during emergency calls.

The new hall will have five bay doors, one for each response vehicle.

»cmcdowell@brandonsun.com