Drumheller Town Council has selected the contractor to renovate the Aquaplex and install a new gradual entry pool liner.
    At Monday night’s town council meeting, Council selected Pearl Rose Construction from Red Deer to complete the work.
    The project includes the modification of the existing liner, installation of a new liner and hot tub, upgrades to the mechanical, electrical and architectural components within the Aquaplex. The contractors came in with the low bid of $1,475,000.
    “The project is expected to begin in May and should completed by the end of September,” said Deputy Mayor Patrick Kolafa.
    The original project was tendered last fall, however, at the October 31, 2016 meeting, Council rejected all tenders as they had come in over the expected budget.
    This time around there was a more competitive field with eight companies bidding on the project. Pearl Rose Construction’s bid came in at about 5 per cent less than the current pre-tender estimate and has a savings of $217,345 when compared to the best bid last fall.
    The project is still valued more than the initial estimate.
    “By going back to reconfigure and re-tender, demonstrates we did do our due diligence in making sure we were able to get the best price. The more competitive bidding process assured this,” said Kolafa, adding that the bulk of the funds are carried over from the 2016 capital budget.
    He is looking forward to the new renovations.
    “The new liner will reduce maintenance and gain efficiencies, while at the same time provide a new and better experience for pool users. The gradual entry will be suitable for young younger families and provide greater accessibility.
    The outdoor pool will remain fully operational during the construction.

The March 9 session of the 2017 Royal Tyrrell Museum’s Speaker Series is a presentation by Darren Tanke, Preparation Technician at the Royal Tyrrell Museum, entitled “Palaeontologists Can Be Archaeologists: Use of Palaeontological Plaster Jacketing Techniques to Collect an Archaeological Feature from Head Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, Alberta.”
The Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology assisted the Royal Alberta Museum on two major archaeological projects in the summer of 2016. The first, near Elk Point, was the recovery of part of a stone hearth from the Fort George trading post from about 1792. The second project, at Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Park near Fort Macleod, was the recovery of a 1,300-year-old First Nations roasting pit complete with skeletal remains of an uneaten meal.
Although both archaeologists and palaeontologists dig into the ground for artifacts or specimens, the disciplines differ in many ways in their field extraction techniques.
In his talk, Tanke explains how he trained the archaeologists in dinosaur skeleton collecting techniques and how to make large plaster field jackets to recover large archaeological features — a first for this type of collaboration in Canada. Both projects posed some unique technical challenges that Tanke had to solve on the spot using his nearly forty years of field experience with the Royal Tyrrell Museum.
The Royal Tyrrell Museum’s Speaker Series talks are free and open to the public. They are held every Thursday until April 27 at 11:00 a.m. in the Museum auditorium. Past Speaker Series talks are also available on the Museum’s YouTube channel: youtube.com/user/RoyalTyrrellMuseum
Cutline: Darren Tanke…
to present at Speaker Series