After the earthquake in Wenzhuan, the safety of school premises has aroused greet concern in China. It is learned from the municipal education bureau of Ningbo that the three-year project of school premise reconstruction has had 125 schools completed while the entire project is expected to be completed by the end of the year, by which time all the 800,000 primary and middle school students will be having classes in seismic resistant classrooms.
In 2009, Ningbo planned to conduct the safety assessment, removal, reconstruction and consolidation of primary and middle school premises of the city within 3 years. The plan included 287 schools, involving an investment of ¥5.03 billion. Up to now, a total sum of ¥3.91 billion has been invested, with 218 schools having been or still being reconstructed.
After reconstruction, all the schools will be seismic-resistant.
It is learned that the reconstruction project involves all the primary and middle schools of the city, public or private alike. After safety assessment, a total number of 287 schools have been included in the plan.
What safety problems to be solved?
According to a person in charge of finance of the project, one task is to reinforce school premises with safety hazards in arrears of high seismic intensity of or over 7 degrees. "After reconstruction, all schools must be 7-degree seismic-resistant."
Schools with safety hazards of flooding, landslides, mud avalanche and typhoons are required to be moved to safety.
Moreover, schools with safety hazards from lightening and fire are to be reconstructed, with dangerous houses relocated, reconstructed or reinforced accordingly.
In addition to the school that need reconstruction of reinforcement, 93 schools need to be removed and rebuilt altogether. Now 72 of them are under construction and 44 have been completed.
"The safety of school premises concerns everyone and that is why we are going to build them into safest places so that parents can rest assured of the kids' safety," said the person in charge.
A visit to the construction sites
The administrative buildings of some schools may not be completed in time.
On the tenth, the teaching buildings and administrative buildings were seen surrounded by scaffolds on the usually quiet campuses of Don'en Middle School, Li Xinggui Middle School, Lumei Middle School and Kongpu Middle School and so on.
According to a person in charge of the construction at Dong'en, 5 to 6 buildings of the school need to be reconstructed and now work on the pillars, beams and wall is almost finished while the decoration of the exterior walls in under way.
It is learned that the new standard of seismic-resistance was issued after 1990 and many of the school houses built before that cannot meet the seismic resistance requirement. Most of the school premises included in the project belong to such houses.
Then how can old buildings be made seismic-resistant? It is learned that consolidation is mainly done on columns, beams and walls with steel reinforced concrete to make them quake-proof.
So far, there are 93 schools in the city busily under construction while the summer vacation is drawing to the close. Will the project delay the re-opening of schools?
"We are pressed for time indeed, but with proper scheduling, we will make it before the vacation ends," said a person in charge.
As for Haishu District, 14 primary and middle schools are still being constructed. A person responsible for safety in the district education bureau said "work on teaching buildings must be finished before August 25, which is the deadline." However, since the amount of work is enormous, work on the administrative and laboratory buildings of a few schools might be delayed a little.