Lyme - Construction to renovate the Town Hall and build a new library, a project residents approved last year, is slated to begin next month.

The plans will transform the main section of Town Hall from office space into a large meeting hall similar to its historical appearance as a church. The project will also add more room for offices, an expanded vault and technology upgrades.

The new library will feature a program room for community events and will house the archives currently located at the Lyme Public Hall. The renovations will comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Residents approved the $4.7 million project on the condition that $1 million come from private donations and grants.

Estimated to take about 14 months, construction is scheduled to begin on Sept. 23. The town will start building the library and renovating the Town Hall simultaneously, which cuts out at least four months of construction time and saves money, explained Janis Witkins, a member of the Town Campus Center Building Committee. The committee had originally considered starting to build the library first.

While construction will require at times temporarily relocating some Town Hall offices and meeting rooms, the Town Hall and library will remain open throughout the process, said Witkins.

"The whole thing is planned so neither the library nor the Town Hall will be closed," said Witkins. "We'll keep all the regular hours and days."

The existing library will remain in place until the new library structure is complete, said Witkins.

As work begins on the new library, contractors will also start building an addition to Town Hall and renovating all offices and rooms except the main building, once a church, said Witkins. At times during ongoing construction, some offices will move to the main building or to temporary structures. Some meetings will also need to occur in the temporary compartments.

Construction on the main building will be the project's last piece likely to begin six months before the final completion date. Witkins explained that the town has now shelved plans for a historic grant and designation for the church building, since the project's time frame makes it ineligible for the grant, which would need to be in place before construction could begin.

But she said the committee is continuing with plans to restore the building and the town may apply for smaller grants.

The project will not affect traffic routes, but construction trucks will travel to and from the Town Hall and library area, said Witkins. There will also likely be a construction entrance for the new library's construction site.

Witkins also said the town is mindful of keeping noise down and refraining from construction at late hours.

The town has hired Enterprise Builders of Newington as the contractor. The project will go out to bid again for subcontracts, since that bid process, which opened in early July, resulted in few bids for some items and came in at an overall higher cost than anticipated, according to committee members.

The committee decided at its meeting Thursday to advertise again, add more "user-friendly" instructions to the bid documents, offer additional walk-throughs of the site area, and reduce costs through "value engineering" options for some of the products' design, among other steps. The bid process will formally open on Monday, and bids will be due Aug. 28.

"We are all very optimistic that we'll get more participants, and hopefully that will lead to more competitive bids," said Chairman Dan Hagan at the meeting.

k.drelich@theday.com