Photo: Gerald Martineau
The 19th Century building in the Glencarlyn neighborhood is undergoing a massive, $500,000 renovation. Plans are to see it completed by the end of summer.
The project that would have simply fixed some siding at Carlin Hall in the Glencarlyn neighborhood grew to a half-million dollars when inspectors started looking more closely behind the walls and under the floors of the 120-year-old building last winter.
Renovations started shortly after the neighborhood celebrated its 125th anniversary in early June. Peter Olivere, who was Glencarlyn Civic Association president until July 1, said the building is moving ahead nicely, and he was "very pleased" that the county was doing such a thorough job in the repairs.
The project is scheduled to be completed in January 2013, is on time and within budget, said Peter Connell, the project manager with the county.
"We have contingency funds that we haven't exceeded," Connell said. "So far we haven't run into anything outside of our worst expectations....We're in pretty good shape right now."
Still, the building is old and the county is trying to make restorations that will last 50 or 100 years, officials have said. There is always the chance that another problem will surface.
"We're trying to fix it, we're trying to fix the building...and restore it in the proper manner," Connell said.
Renovations will not only shore-up weaknesses but will be historically more accurate than some of the changes made to the building in the 1960s and later. The county has owned the building since 1961.
See our slideshow for more.
Gerald Martineau is a photographer who regularly works with the Arlington Mercury and reports some on what he shoots. He lives in the Glencarlyn neighborhood and originally shot these photos for their newsletter. The photos are not released under our creative commons license.
