From The Tribune Staff Reports
TRUSSVILLE — Mayor Buddy Choat announced Thursday, October 21, at the State of the City Address, plans to build a new Fire Station No. 4.
Choat offered renderings of the new building that will incorporate red brick and stone inspired by the stacked rock on the gazebo across the street from City Hall. Turner Batson designed the look of the building, and Choat said the design is a traditional look that ties in many architectural designs in the Trussville area.
“A fire station is going to be just incredible for training for our staff or other officers to work,” Choat said. “We’re at the point now with not only our population but our coverage area is expanding where we have needed another fire station, so we’re currently looking at Trussville Clay Road just past the Civic Center.”
Choat said that the plan is to move all fire administration offices to have everyone in the same area so that when people come into the fire administration office, it’s all in one location that’s easy to locate.
The creation of Fire Station No. 4 pulls from the “2040 Plan.” Additionally, Choat said when looking to the future, they listened to what the community had to say, and many requested a new fire station. Having a fire station in this area will create a better way for the first responders to access the community and accommodate businesses and people affected by an emergency.
“So a lot of this is in that 2040 Vision Plan that our citizens had told us about, and so a fire station was one and to upgrade a lot of our city facilities for police and fire,” Choat said.
The city has received approval from City Council to look for the best course of action to create Fire Station No. 4.
“We’ve had some environmental studies already done on it, and we’re just making sure that the design will fit on the site; we think it’s gonna fit perfectly on the site that we’ve chosen,” Choat said. “We haven’t got the final word just yet, on the planning as far as if it’ll be that size, or we may have to turn the building a little bit and eliminate one of the corners. That’s the look we want; we would love for that to be out there. I think it’d be a beautiful look, kind of a traditional red brick fire station that brings in the rock look of Trussville.”