Land has been secured in the Walden community for a new Montgomery County Emergency Services District No. 2 fire station set to start construction in July and finish in July 2023, fire Chief Brian Edwards said. The existing fire station, Station No. 54, was found to have structural issues, so employees will be moved to the new station, which is being built across the street at the southwest corner of Walden Road and Emerson Drive.
The existing station at 12500 Walden Road, Montgomery, had repairs done after structural deficiencies were found six years ago, but larger issues, such as the foundation, made the best option be to rebuild or move locations, Edwards said.
Edwards said the new station comes with growth in the community.
“It's definitely gotten busier in this area,” Edwards said. “I think we run 1,000 calls a year, so we're up about a call per day.”
Edwards said the department will seek construction bids in mid-March for the project, which will be funded by sales and property tax revenue. The project will cost around $2 million and take about a year to complete, he said.
Montgomery County Municipal Utility District No. 8 owns the existing station, so it is unknown what will be done with the station once the new one is built, Edwards said. The MUD provides water for firefighting, and the MUD and ESD—both taxing entities—work on projects such as water treatment plants, he said.
Edwards said the decision to build a station on a new site was also made due to not having a temporary location while rebuilding occurs.
“It was [going to] cost us more to repair the station and get it up to the new fire code and all that compared to building a new station,” Edwards said. “There wasn't really a space for us to have temporary housing to keep the responders in Walden, so that was an additional expense that we were going to have and the logistics of doing it because there's not a lot of room anywhere in Walden for that.”
