KY3 Inc. begins $4.3M addition, remodel

Construction began Sept. 19 on a 20,000-square-foot addition to the 999 W. Sunshine St. location of KY3 Inc. Upon completion, KSPR, which officially became KY3's sister station in August 2007, will move its operations to a new studio, newsroom and offices in the added space.

According to a city of Springfield building permit, the project has an estimated value of $4.3 million.

"When we started managing the station, basically, the current building at 1359 St. Louis St., had not been updated in quite some time, from a cosmetic standpoint and a technological standpoint," KY3 Inc. President and General Manager Mike Scott said. "So rather than go in and rehab that facility, it made more of an economical sense to add-on here, and basically we are going to replace all of their technology."

Scott said several of the KSPR operations had already moved to the Sunshine Street location, including the accounting, traffic and sales departments. He said that while the addition is largely the KSPR newsroom and studio, it also allows for the expansion of the sales and digital departments that had already run out of space.

The digital transition

On Feb. 17, 2009, television stations will be federally required to switch analog broadcasting to full digital broadcasting. Scott said the transition brings opportunity to the station.

"When we took over KSPR, not a lot had been done," he said. "(The responsibility) fell into our hands to complete the digital transition of the signal, which we just completed this past August."

He said the company is calling the project a building addition/remodel because there's going to be a lot of improvements made on the KY3 side as well with the expansion of the creative services, digital and sales departments. A community meeting room will benefit KY3, KSPR, Ozarks CW and KY3 Weather Plus.

Scott said the addition of a fully digital studio and control room would make KSPR more competitive in the market.

"The new studio for KSPR will be fully digital when it begins operations (at the West Sunshine studio)," Scott said, noting that high-definition and digital television are not synonymous; while all TV stations will convert to digital in February as required by the Federal Communications Commission, not all programs will be available in a high-definition format.

"KSPR's new studio will be digital as well as high-definition. In essence, both KY3 and KSPR will complete the digital-high definition conversion of our local facility with this building," he added.

Building specifics

General contractor Killian Construction is now installing and improving the storm water requirements.

Bruce Leeth, senior project manager with Killian, said the project construction will be visible in about 60 days. Work is under way on a new parking lot, as the addition will be built where the current parking lot sits.

"It will take about 30 days to do the new parking lot, then we will start on the new construction," he said.

The building will be made of block structure and metal stud. Architect Bill Woody of Marshall Waters Woody Architecture and Planning, said the roof was a unique building feature included in the design.

"In order to minimize the effects of the exterior environment (noise) in the new studio, it was determined that the roof construction be designed utilizing pre-stressed concrete and soun-dampening roof insulation," he said via e-mail. "Phasing of the construction was essential to minimize exposure of the existing spaces to noise and dust."

Leeth said working alongside the existing building will be a challenge, including an approximate 45-day transitional period. "We will be interrupting the normal routine of the existing facility when we penetrate the old building and attach the new building," he said. "That will be a challenge just to make sure, keep everybody being able do what they can do in a quiet manner. We do have to work around their news broadcasts on some of this work. So we'll actually be in there at 1, 2, 3 o'clock in the morning ... so we don't interrupt news broadcasts."

Contractually, the project is slated to be done by late May with KY3 Inc. and KSPR taking approximately 60 days to move into the facility. Upon completion, the joining buildings will house 185 employees.[[In-content Ad]]