Latimer Lakes school project nears closeout; committee approves invoices and change orders after acoustics and HVAC testing

The Simsbury Public Building Committee on an unspecified Feb. meeting date approved a series of payments, a purchase order and several change orders for the Latimer Lakes school construction project after receiving test results showing most classrooms meet reverberation targets but some rooms have higher-than-desired background noise.

Consultants said most classrooms met the project's reverberation targets of 0.6 to 0.7 seconds, but tests found ambient background noise in some rooms between 40 and 45 decibels, above the 35-decibel target.

Justin Hopkins, Tekton Architects, said, "The target reverberation time is 0.6 seconds" for smaller classrooms and "0.7" for larger rooms and that "for most of the tests, we are at our target number, 0.6 to 0.7." He added that one unfurnished…